Four Walls
by SarahSwan7
Summary: Zaf has been presumed dead for years, but new evidence points towards him being alive. After surviving a jump from a multi-storey building, Lucas restarts his life and is tasked to find him. Two dead men must now live to defeat a plot that could cripple the service that they've already died for.
1. Chapter 1

The four walls were a pale, grubby colour, the kind of colour that the bottom of a mug turns when a small layer of coffee is left undrunk. Each wall was made up of large, ragged bricks that were unevenly arranged and rough to the touch, and the floor was made of a similar uncomfortable stone. The only welcome break from the awful place was a tiny window that gave a view to the outside, and even that was limited by the four determined steel bars that went deep down into the bricks. At least the window provided a breath of fresh air now and again to waft through the otherwise stifling room.

It was late afternoon. At least, it felt like late afternoon, but it was always so hot that it had become difficult to differentiate between the sections of the day. At around this time, when the sun slid through the tiny window and lit up the ugliness of the room, he would pull himself to his feet and clasp the bars, peering outside. The view was hardly pleasant – it only looked out onto a little courtyard where shrubs desperately tried to grow amongst the cracks in the paving stones and a tiny, chipped fountain ran. That very fountain was a source of torment, as he could not remember the last time a cool glass of water had reached his lips. Every day he rubbed the sweat from his face, clambered to his knees, looked out of the window at the water flowing freely in the fountain and felt a horrible shudder course through him. It was so hot. The water looked so cool. The sound was agonising.

Then again, it was a distraction from the pain. He looked down at his arms and legs, marred with scars and burns and bruises. The little that was left of his shirt clung to his skin with blood. His hair was longer now and caked with grime. A sharp, jagged line from one shoulder down to the top of his thigh stopped him from sleeping on his back anymore.

A few weeks or a month ago, it was hard to tell - time seemed to blur into one endless, horrible smudge – he had found a small, metal nail pushed into the brickwork next to one of the window bars. It had taken him two days to scrape away at the stone around it with his thumbnail and prise it out. The small metal nail allowed him to scrape carvings into the brick. It was a distraction. His thumbnail was bloodied, the nail mostly worn away, but it didn't matter.

The first thing he thought to engrave upon the walls of this cell were his initials. A tiny Z and Y in the left hand corner of the wall with the window, the space in which he chose to sleep. Each time that he woke he would carve into the initials again, pushing them further into the brickwork.

There was one other thing that Zafar Younis carved into the stone with the tiny nail. His memory of what had been happening since capture was hazy, but a string of numbers at the back of his mind seemed necessary to take note of. If he had remembered them, they must be of some value. He also scratched the string of numbers into his skin, just in case he was moved from here. His instincts were good, and for some reason he couldn't quite remember, he knew that those numbers might be of use to him in the future.

If he even had a future. Just a while ago he had watched as another prisoner was dragged out into the courtyard and got a bullet in the back of their head. There had been no rain since, and so he could just make out the sticky trail of crimson that smudged the paving stone on which that prisoner had taken his last breath.

Zaf wondered if he too had been a spy. He hoped he hadn't been. That would mean that, eventually, these people would realise that Zaf was no longer useful to them. Spies don't give information lightly, and even the most brutal torture wouldn't guarantee that an agent would talk.

His eyes wandered over to the wall he tried not to look at, for that wall held the door. The frame was thin and looked easy enough to overcome, but the jangle of keys and click of locks told Zaf that he was closely guarded. Whenever someone came into the room he often thought of making a dash for it, but merely standing up was becoming an exertion, let alone making a break for freedom.

Every so often he'd be given a bowl of water. The bowl made him feel like a scrawny animal that deserved no better, and the water itself was so warm that he'd rather not bother drinking it. But it was likely to be the only source of water he would have, unless one day he got to the fountain, just metres away from his cell window.

Occasionally he would get food. Usually just after they held matches to his arms or ripped chunks from his hair, they would throw him a lump of bread or a sour piece of fruit. He regarded it as a reward for holding up.

Zaf carved along the cracks in the bricks with the nail, trying to find just one brick that was looser than the rest. Finally, he had been able to remove a small chunk, just large enough for him to stretch his hand outside. Of course, he slotted it back into place whenever anyone came into the room. But it was another extra source of coolness. Sometimes at night, if he was lucky, he could feel the breeze on his face as he fell asleep.

Zaf carved the string of numbers again, like a ritual, a rhythm. He hoped it would somehow keep him sane, even when, increasingly, everything seemed more and more pointless.


	2. Chapter 2

Lucas' eyes were directed at the road, even though he knew the route like the back of his hand. The snow made everything look cleaner, mystical, and he tried to convince himself that this wasn't the same Moscow that he had known. Maybe the snowstorm could bury the memories that pierced his head when he heard snatches of conversation in Russian and saw the familiar sights.

The windows of the sleek car were down, letting a chilled wind rip through the 60mph vehicle. The temperature was below minus, as usual, even though the November sun was desperately trying to claw through the clouds. Lucas felt the breeze run through his hair as he tapped the steering wheel, guiding the car smoothly around the twists in the road.

Tall fir trees lined each side, capped with the snow, and made the thinning road seem closed off from everything else. The sun dipped below a thicker layer of cloud and the trees locked in the darkness. Lucas blinked hard twice and slowed a little, gripping the steering wheel so his knuckles matched the colour of the snow.

His throat burned; a sour combination of coffee and cigarettes. Most of his time in Moscow had been spent sitting in freezing surveillance vehicles or waiting at rendezvous. Swallowing an hourly espresso in attempt to preserve some warmth and smoking a cigarette were ways that Lucas tried to distract himself from the mundane nature of being an inactive field officer.

Lucas pulled up outside another unfamiliar hotel, slamming the door of the car and searching for his wallet in a coat pocket. His phone rang a shrill sound that echoed in the empty parking lot. He pulled off a glove with his teeth and answered the call with a gruff: "Hello?"

"Lucas," said the voice on the other end. He froze, and asked even though he knew: "Who is this?" His voice cracked.

"It's Harry," said the voice, a trifle confused. "I thought you'd be expecting my call."

"Right, yeah, sorry." Lucas attempted to sound blasé. He stamped his boots against the snow-covered concrete and shivered into his coat, scratching ice under his nail from the side of the car.

"We've got you something back here, unless you'd prefer to continue monitoring known rendezvous points of low level petty criminals-"

"What have you got?" was the desperate reply.

"It's major. One of our officers who we thought was killed three years ago may well be alive. I want you to find him."

"What's him name?" asked Lucas.

"Zafar Younis. He was one of our best. We found remains of a body with his teeth, the only part left that could be identified as him."

Lucas had never heard of him, but the gory detail sent a chill through him that had nothing to do with the cold.

"Where do you think he is?"

"Istanbul – we've established a rough location."

Lucas' teeth were chattering. "I'll do it. Ring me later. Get me the next flight out of here, Harry." He snapped the phone shut and paced into the mildly warmer hotel lobby.

The call of the time of his flight came about six hours later. Lucas had been sleeping – at least, attempting to sleep. The bed in the hotel room was uncomfortable, especially after he had got into the habit of sleeping on the floor. The covers were rough and bobbly and the mattress had springs that Lucas could feel pressing into his back. A drunken argument in next door's room was also a preventative measure of him getting a good night's sleep.

"A car will pick you up in 40 minutes."

"Cheers, Harry." Lucas tried to sound grateful but his voice was gruff.

"See you soon Lucas." The call ended. Lucas pulled on his coat and stuffed his hands in his pockets, bracing himself for the freezing night air.


	3. Chapter 3

The flight from Moscow to Istanbul had only been a small number of hours, but stepping into the stale air made it feel very far from the bracing Russian gales. Lucas, shielding his eyes with sunglasses and carrying a backpack, made his way through the bustle of the airport out into the street, locating his waiting vehicle.

He had never been to Turkey before and didn't really know what to expect, but so far he had deduced that it was still quite warm even in November, to the extent that he removed his jacket and rolled up his shirtsleeves.

Harry had been vague about his accommodation, only stating that it was within walking distance to where they believed Zafar was being kept. Lucas was to observe the building for a few days and try to establish the best route inside.

His vehicle pulled up outside what looked like a tiny, dishevelled cottage, constructed from an assorted colour of bricks and possessing only two windows, neither of which giving a clear view in or out of the place due to their discolouration. Lucas handed a couple of notes of the unfamiliar currency to the driver and apprehensively headed inside.

Harry appeared to have forgotten to mention that Lucas was in fact lodging with an elderly couple who owned several scrawny dogs that wandered freely and yapped at Lucas' heels. He bore a strained grimace as he tried to gently swat away the horrible creatures and firmly shut the door of his room, leaving them to scrabble at the doorframe.

Abandoning his poorly-stocked rucksack on the sofa bed, Lucas peered out of the small window. Below, just across the street, he could see a market hustling and bustling, an array of bright and exotic colours. There were shouts of bartering, excited chatter of children, buyers and sellers weaving through the crowds effortlessly. Beyond them, there stood a towering building, blocking out a little of the sun from Lucas' view. He reached for the binoculars from his rucksack to take a closer look. The building was a sluggish yellow colour, littered with windows even smaller than this one, equipped with steel bars. A tiny courtyard sat in the middle, a fountain trickling. It seemed so eerily silent, so distant from the lively marketplace. Then again, the sounds of people babbling would be enough to block out any sounds from the prison building.

Lucas consulted the hazy sketch he had been given to identify Zafar's location and the likeness was uncanny, down to the weeds in each crack and crevice of the pavement courtyard.

Lucas kept watching, willing for some kind of movement. A rustle at the hem of his trouser leg distracted him.

"Shoo," he grunted at the snivelling dog which had overcome the unstable hinges of the door. Its fur was matted and grey, teeth sharp and adamant to cling on to Lucas.

"I said, shoo!" Lucas shook his leg in one swift motion and the dog released its grip, thudding into the door with a whimper before heading back outside of the room, finally getting the impression that he was unwelcome.

Lucas rolled his eyes and readjusted his vision to the building. He squinted – he swore something had changed since he had been distracted by the dog...

There. On the right hand side of the building near the bottom, a tiny brick had been taken out. The space was too small for Lucas to see who or what was inside, but the tiny shiftings of light told of movement. And that space looked small enough to reach through, make contact with whoever was inside.

The late afternoon sun was taking its toll, heating Lucas' face to an uncomfortably warm temperature, persuading him to move away from the window. But before he did, he caught a glimpse of someone through a window, seemingly of the same cell where the brick had been removed. It was difficult to identify them, as the steel bars prevented Lucas from making an accurate assessment of their appearance. But Lucas recognised the deep brown eyes and dark hair and jaw line from a photo in the file that he had been given. He blinked hard against the sun and readjusted his binoculars, but the face had ducked down behind the window.

Lucas let go on the binoculars, letting them swing to a stop against his chest. Then he rifled through his rucksack, pulled out the file, sat down on the rough sofa bed, and read.

Lucas had skimmed the file briefly with his eyes when it was handed to him by the agent that drove him to Domodedovo airport in Moscow, but the contents hardly made for light travel reading.

He had been right. The person in that building who he had seen through the window had been Zafar Younis, now thirty seven years old. His face looked older and lacked the charm and easy smile of the photo that must have been taken when he first joined Section D, which wasn't surprising considering the circumstances. Lucas' eyes moved from the page for a second and he caught his own reflection in the mirror propped up on the chest of drawers in the corner. He shivered and looked back at the file.

Zafar (or Zaf, as he had specified as a preference) had been involved in a variety of operations in MI6 and MI5, where he worked very well alongside Adam Carter. After a weaponised virus was released onto the streets of London, Zaf had been taken, an act of self-sacrifice to save Adam. The team searched for him and discovered a body in Pakistan containing his teeth, which in light of new evidence were known to have been planted so MI5 would give up looking.

Three weeks ago an agent working undercover in Istanbul recognised Zaf as he walked past the building one day – it seemed that they had worked together on an operation at Six years ago. It was a miraculous coincidence and he had called in what he had seen immediately, before being dragged inside by a suspicious guard. He hasn't been seen since.

Lucas was distracted from reading further by a hurried knock at the door. He opened it warily, watching the elderly Turkish woman who owned the cottage usher in an unfamiliar man.

"Friend of yours," she said uncertainly, before making herself scarce.

The man looked like one of the people from outside in the market, with a weather-beaten face and a coloured shirt. He handed Lucas a tiny bag with leather straps and said: "From Malcolm."

_Malcolm?_ Lucas thought. He hadn't seen him since-

It had been a long time ago.

The curious man left the room silently. Lucas opened the strings of the bag and peered inside with a smile.


	4. Chapter 4

Mercifully, Zaf had had a busy schedule.

He was woken by a lump of bread being thrown at his body, directly hitting the wound on his side which he had attained yesterday from a scorching metal rod. He spent as long as possible picking apart the bread in his hands, eating as slowly as he was able, collecting the crumbs that had escaped to the ground. Then the markets outside started blaring. The guards usually made sure that they kept their distance, but today was hot and many more people than usual were gathered about the array of stalls, talking and laughing. Zaf could smell freshly cooked rolls hinted with spice and looked down disappointedly at the tiny piece of crust he had left, balanced on his knee.

He watched as a child sprinted to the tiny fountain, filling a plastic bottle with the water gleefully. More people got the same idea, wiping sweat from their brows and gathering around the fountain just metres away from Zaf. He was peering desperately out of the window, but not one eye looked his away. Although, Zaf did notice someone standing a little closer to him than the rest. This particular person blended in superficially at least, with cheerful clothes and bagfuls of goods slung over his shoulders - but he stood a little taller than everyone else and his face was not as welcoming. Zaf watched his eyes scan the area quickly, discreetly, before he turned his attention to him.

Zaf couldn't think of anything other to do than stare oddly at the man, taking in his piercing blue eyes and chiselled features. He looked healthy and sophisticated – suddenly self-conscious, Zaf wiped a smear of blood from his face and blinked several times, watching the man walk closer. He knelt down beside the tiny missing piece of brick that Zaf had removed earlier that morning. Uncertainly, he also knelt down to face the stranger.

"Who are you?" he asked, his voice sounding nothing like his own. Zaf remembered being confident and charming, and didn't recognise the croaked question of his new self.

"A friend," the voice insisted. He started fumbling in a small bag. Zaf watched him uneasily. Then the stranger reached back through, this time with a handful of nuts in his palm.

"Eat," he instructed, holding his hand further towards Zaf. He scooped up the nuts, aware of the skin of the stranger and how clean and healthy it looked compared to his own hands, dirty and scar-riddled.

The stranger withdrew his hand quickly and peered into the cell, looking at Zaf properly. "From Malcolm," he said.

_Malcolm?_

Before Zaf could question this, the stranger had clambered back to his feet and disappeared into the crowds.

Zaf carefully laid the nuts down onto the floor. They were small and spherical, a typical chestnutty colour. Zaf was completely unfamiliar with which nuts and berries were safe to eat abroad. Also, food that was sold cheaply in markets, sitting outside on a stall all day in the sun, was notorious for being a little dodgy on the stomach. He wondered for a second whether they might even be spiked, a cruel joke on the part of the stranger. Zaf picked one up regardless, reaching for the piece of brick.

One well placed thump cracked the nut, although Zaf flinched at the loudness of the noise, fearing it may have attracted the attention of one of his captors. After waiting for a few seconds, Zaf dug amongst the shell for a piece of the nut and placed it in his mouth, chewing carefully. He was still sceptical as to whether they were edible – but why would the stranger mention Malcolm's name and then feed him poison? That man must have some connection to Five, and maybe, a route out for him.

Zaf cracked a second nut, then a third, gathering the tiny pieces in his palm and eating small bites. Not only did he want to preserve the little food he had for as long as possible, but his gums were alive with a sizzling pain. Many years back – how many years had it been since Asnik and the virus? – his previous captors had plucked teeth from the back of his mouth, and they hadn't exactly been generous with anaesthetic. He still felt a surge of pain running his tongue along the inflamed pieces of gum that remained.

The market hum sounded more distant now, and Zaf cracked the fourth nut more carefully, attempting to disguise the noise made when the brick connected with the thin shell. This particular nut was slightly darker in colour and broke a little more easily than the others had. Zaf flicked away the shards of shell and picked up the small piece that remained.

Zaf knew for sure that this wasn't edible. The tiny piece in his hand was recognisable from such a long time ago that Zaf almost laughed, and then felt an overwhelming surge of sadness. He decided to act upon neither emotion, instead carefully flicking the tiny switch on the listening device to active and pushing it into his ear.

"Can you hear me?" Zaf whispered, his voice barely audible.

"It's good to hear you Mr Younis," said the voice, so polite, so sincere, so familiar that Zaf felt a fierce slash of homesickness.

"Can you get me out of here?"

"You've never doubted us before, Zaf," replied Malcolm lightly. "The person who gave you this is called Lucas. Tonight at 9pm I'll patch him through to you and you will discuss escape options. Do you understand?"

Zaf took a few seconds to reply, trying to comprehend what he was hearing. _Escape?_

"Zaf?" Malcolm prompted.

"I understand. Wait, how do I know when it's 9pm?" he panicked suddenly.

"Keep the listening device in place and Lucas will make first contact."

"Okay..." Zaf couldn't think of anything else to say. "Thank you Malcolm." He suddenly couldn't bear the thought of Malcolm disconnecting the line.

"Pleasure to have you back," was the simple, comforting reply.

Zaf leaned back against one of the walls and let a smile spread across his face.


	5. Chapter 5

Lucas paced across the woven carpet steadily, every so often glancing up at the clock that hung on the wall. He wasn't pacing because he was angry or stressed about something – rather, he was anxious.

After betraying the service and holding a gun to his boss' head, Lucas knew he had no future. His friends had turned against him; the service he thought he loved had bombarded him with so much confusion and hatred that the thought of plummeting off the building away from everything was irresistible. Even Maya, the woman he'd known for fifteen years and loved, had been a victim of his mistakes, her lifeless body dumped by an unfamiliar roadside, her smart clothes drenched with blood.

Lucas didn't expect to wake up after the fall - he didn't want to. Other than a shock to his system, broken bones and some deep glass cuts from the car on which he had landed, there wasn't physically any long term damage. Sure, being confined to a wheelchair due to two broken legs for weeks was hardly fun and games, but his bones fixed and his scars healed and Lucas looked like he was going to make a full recovery.

It had been strange, really, being Lucas. Although, when he awoke in the hospital and the doctor asked if he could remember his name, Lucas was the one that came to his lips. That proved it, really – what an effortless liar he was. John Bateman, his real identity, had been hidden for so long that Lucas felt it would be too surreal to return to it. He would live as Lucas North, the fake, the liar.

And if Lucas was a liar, and his love was gone, what was left for him? The hospital put him on suicide watch, and rightly so. But a few weeks into his recovery he was visited by a very tired looking Harry Pearce, equipped with a guard. Lucas didn't know whether to feel insulted that Harry had brought an unwelcome guest to protect him, but he was wise in doing so, judging by what happened the last time they had met. It seemed like such a long time ago, although for Harry the shock of it all was evidently still close to the surface.

Harry visited often, the two of them hardly speaking at all at first, until Harry mentioned Lucas' return to the service. Lucas could hardly believe what he was hearing and knew there would be some catch, which inevitably there was. He could still be a civil servant, but not with the rank he once held. He would be working abroad, mainly, so working for Six instead of Five, and never to see the team he once led again. Lucas often thought of Harry and Ruth and Dimitri and the others when he was festering in that hospital bed, wondering if they ever thought of him and hoping they didn't. The last memory they all had of him was tainted. They probably wished that he had met his death after leaving that rooftop.

Although surprisingly, Harry didn't. He visited Lucas without a guard later on, and they talked often of the old times. Lucas enquired after the team and Harry said they were doing well. _Without me_, Lucas often thought, tinged with sadness. _Everything was fine without me._

This wasn't merely the thinking of an injured, fatigued man – Lucas genuinely believed this to be the truth. When he had been carted off to a Russian prison and Tom Quinn was left to take the reins, he had been accepted and respected and didn't end up dead, albeit the lies and falsity rooted at the heart of the service ruined him in the end. And then Adam Carter, so witty and cunning and loveable. So tragically killed just as Lucas had arrived back. When he was reinstated to the team he felt it impossible to live up to his predecessors.

But worst of all, it seemed that he may have actually been good. Worthy of being section chief. And then he threw it all away.

The clock on the wall of Lucas' wall chimed loudly, snapping him back to the present. It was quarter to nine. In fifteen minutes he would talk to Zaf properly for the first time. Lucas could make out the image of the prison from the window, even more intimidating shrouded in darkness. The night air was cool, brushing through the window and chilling Lucas' otherwise warm accommodation. He winced at the thought of Zaf curled in the corner of that lifeless place, the ground for a bed, shivering in the shadows.

The elderly couple who owned the house had gone out for the evening, leaving Lucas behind with their horrible, yapping dogs. One of them had curled up in the corner of Lucas' room about half an hour ago and Lucas couldn't be bothered to shoo him away again. He knew it safe to contact Zaf from here – had the couple stayed in for the night, Lucas would have gone for a walk.

This was his chance to get things right. Lucas knew that his relationship with the service, with Harry, had been severed. But a shard of him felt that it wasn't irreversible. Lucas didn't know why Harry had given him such a responsibility of saving a fellow officer, but hoped it was a step towards regaining his trust. Maybe, if he got Zaf out and got the two of them safely back to Thames House; the team might welcome him back with open arms.

Who was even on the team now? He had no idea who had survived the last year. A role at MI5 was often so transient that Lucas hadn't the slightest clue if any of the officers he had known were still alive.

Nine o'clock chimed out in the otherwise silent room. Lucas flicked the switch on his listening device and cleared his throat.

"Zaf, this is Lucas. Can you hear me?"


	6. Chapter 6

Zaf was counting down the seconds until Lucas made contact. He didn't mind when his captors pulled out three more fingernails. He didn't mind when the night drew in and the air was freezing. All of the hardships of the day were insignificant compared to the goodness of finally getting a chance to escape at 9 o'clock this evening. Zaf had forgotten what it felt like to anticipate something fantastic, and he was relishing the feeling.

Of course, he didn't have a clock and so couldn't accurately count down until nine, but after the endless days he had spent here, Zaf had become familiar with the schedule. For example, the markets usually packed up when the sky darkened, which, judging by British winters, made it about five o'clock at the latest. After that, the captors did their rounds of the building, taking and torturing the inhabitants. Zaf's personal evening session lasted, he estimated, thirty minutes, but he was a special case. The others may not have even had a visit. Zaf compared the size of the building to the size of his cell and deduced there was room for at least another fifteen cells.

By the time it took for his captors to work their way round all of the cells, Zaf estimated it would be around seven. In the distance, he could hear a low murmur of street life and smell the scents from restaurants, which would probably be open until at least eleven. When the noise had died down, all the cars gone, the people returned home and only the sound of the wind whistling remaining, Zaf thought it to be midnight. Then he would curl in the corner and attempt to sleep, being woken too soon when the sun pierced through the window or when one of his captors came to wake him in a variety of unpleasant ways. It filled Zaf with pure, overwhelming relief when he realised he would never spend another night here.

Zaf pulled himself to his feet, peering outside of the window. He wondered where Lucas was, whether he was dining or walking or sleeping. Zaf did none of those things. In fact, he couldn't remember the last time he had eaten a proper meal; the last time he had walked without a fierce pain crushing his legs; the last time he had slept peacefully.

There was a burst of static, then the voice: "Zaf, this is Lucas. Can you hear me?"

"Yeah, I've got you," whispered Zaf excitedly.

"You alright?" Lucas' voice asked a serious question but it sounded comfortingly conversational.

"I've been better," Zaf half-laughed, wincing at the pain on his face as his skin stretched into a small smile.

"Are you strong enough to stand?" questioned Lucas.

"Yeah." It was true, although even if his legs were broken Zaf believed he could pull himself out of here. His captors had been generous on the food lately, even giving him water in a plastic bottle on one occasion. It had unnerved Zaf at first, but now he didn't bother questioning it, instead savouring every sip and bite he was provided with.

"Do you know how many captors there are?"

"At least three. And there are guards, six I think," said Zaf.

"Okay. Obviously, I can't just stroll up and ask for you back. How's the door?"

"Solid, and locked several times," replied Zaf, for the first time feeling a sense of hopelessness.

"Right. Not a problem. We'll go for the explosion," replied Lucas efficiently.

"Explosion?" Zaf asked in disbelief.

"Yeah. It'll be small but should blast through the wall. When it happens, you have to get out fast - run if you can. They'll be seconds away. When you're ready, I'll go down to my car; it's just across the road."

"Okay. Where's the explosion?"

"It's another one of the nuts. I left it just outside the wall when I passed you the others. You might want to check it hasn't rolled away."  
Carefully, Zaf removed the piece of brick and fumbled outside, his hand closing over a tiny sphere.

"It's here."

"Okay. Shall I go down to my car now?"

"Yeah," whispered Zaf. He liked how Lucas was talking him through the process slowly, as Zaf was now facing a crushing sense of fear. What if this didn't go to plan?

"I'm in my car. Look out of the window."

Zaf squinted into the darkness, which was suddenly cut through by the brief glow of headlights, once, twice, before they faded.

"You see that?"

"Yeah."

"Move towards the door and cover your face." Zaf did as he was instructed.

"Are you ready, Zaf?" Lucas asked.

"Yes," he said, his voice hopeful.

The explosion was sudden and louder than Zaf had expected, but pretty compacted. A couple of brick had flown towards him, clattering at his feet, but it was the smoke that was the problem. Zaf coughed and stumbled forward blindly, falling to his knees when his foot snagged on some debris. He proceeded to crawl as quickly as possible over the path of bricks, horribly aware of the sound of his captors at his door, fumbling at the lock.

"Stay where you are!" someone bellowed, and then a little quieter: "Get this bloody door open now!"

Soon the bricks underneath Zaf's hands and feet were replaced by the pavement of the courtyard, the weeds bristling beneath his fingers. Zaf clambered to his feet and ran as fast as he was able, oblivious to the pain rocketing through each one of his limbs. He raced past the fountain at which he had stared at for so long, wishing he could stop just for a few seconds and indulge himself – but there wasn't time.

Zaf could see the headlights of Lucas' car flashing. One hundred feet away. Eighty. Sixty. Forty.

"Hey!" A voice yelled. The same voice that had shouted in Zaf's face for information. The same voice that laughed as Zaf screamed in pain. He felt a harsh wave of nausea but kept moving forward. Twenty feet. Ten.

His hands connected with the smooth exterior of the car and fumbled for the handle. Zaf leapt into the car, crashing down on the seat, feeling the car move swiftly away.

"Are you okay?" asked Lucas.

Zaf looked at him. His face was efficient, serious, focussed on the road.

"I'll be fine," said Zaf.

"You look exhausted."  
"I'll be fine," repeated Zaf, because he couldn't think of what else to say. "Thank you," he added, although thank you didn't even begin to cover the debt he held to this man.

"Not at all," was the reply.

"Where are we going?"

"Safe house," said Lucas, reaching for a bottle of water in the side of the car door and passing it to Zaf. "Here."

Zaf pulled off the lid frantically and downed half of the bottle in seconds, gasping. Then he tipped a little in his hands and rubbed it across his face, wincing as it connected with the scars on his skin.

"Thank you," he said again. Then Zaf leant his head against the window and let his eyes drift shut. For the first time in a long time, he wasn't scared to be shrouded in darkness.


	7. Chapter 7

**Authors' Note: Thank you so much to everyone who had read and/or reviewed so far! I'm really glad that people are enjoying it and I will try to update regularly. Hope you've all had a great weekend! **

Fahir flicked his pocket watch between his fingers and let a slow, sly smile cross his face. He didn't smile often, and on the rare occasion he did it became apparent why he refrained from doing so. His dry, bristly skin drew tauter, causing harsh crinkles around his dark eyes. His mouth was thin and twisted horribly, revealing a row of crooked, yellowing teeth. He scrubbed a dusty hand across his beard and picked dirt from under his fingernails.

How long until his trapped spies would reach the safe house?

They had held him for almost a year now. He had been handed to Fahir by some friends in Pakistan who mumbled his name indecipherably, meaning he didn't quite catch it. Rafar, or Zafar, he thought - he was uncertain as to which, and frankly didn't care. He referred to him only as 'the spy'.

Fahir had been head of this prison for around five years, and he'd never been given someone so important. Rumour has it that the spy was a junior officer from the illustrious MI5. Usually Fahir just dealt with petty criminals and drug hoarders, torturing them for money or simply fun.

As thrilled as Fahir had been at the duty entrusted of him to extract information from a British spy, the said spy had expired his usefulness. Fahir had tried every torture technique and he hadn't uttered a single word of betrayal. Fahir was bored. He was going to kill him in the most painful way he could think of as a punishment for wasting his time.

But a week or so ago, there had been a strange occurrence. The guards were patrolling as usual and one reported a British man arriving at an accommodation just across the road. They said he smelled of service, so Fahir checked it out. Sure enough, this man was from Five or Six or one of those, judging by the contents of his backpack.

Why kill one spy now, when you can wait a little longer and kill two?

It had been so easy that Fahir found it laughable. He saw the man heading to the marketplace, presumably to attempt contact with his little friend. Fahir had called off the guards to make it easy for the stranger and headed across the road to the house. The couple were very old and accepted his story of being an undercover police officer trying to take up surveillance of the prison building. The old woman had nodded, biting her lip, and told Fahir that she sometimes heard screaming.

Fahir planted a listening device in the collar of one of the dogs and moved its favourite toy to the room of the man, knowing that the dog would pine after it and end up remaining outside the door, perhaps even inside if the man got fed up of its scrabbling, within good distance to pick up any further communication he made with the spy prisoner. He had even given the prisoner extra food and water on the days leading up to the escape to confuse him and hopefully make him over-confident.

Fahir's favourite moment was the night of the explosion. Of course, he had guards stationed outside the prisoner's room all along to have a good snigger. When the explosion sounded they took it in turns to shout out cries of shock and anger at the rescue, with one of the guards doing an uncanny British accent: 'Get this bloody door open now!' They were all in hysterics.

Fahir himself had run after the prisoner for a short while, shouting, trying to put him on edge. When he reached the car and they sped away, Fahir swept up the bricks with the rest of them and started counting down the seconds until one of them made further contact. He had slipped an extra bug into the man's backpack at the house.

Two dead spies, all thanks to him. Fahir smiled another loathsome smile and used his shirtsleeve to wipe blood from the sharpened dagger that hung from his belt.


	8. Chapter 8

Lucas' driving had slowed down a little. They had been on the road for over an hour and there hadn't been even a hint of a tail. Lucas felt the muscles in his shoulders relax a little and he loosened his grip on the steering wheel, glancing down at the map spread across his knees. He had been relying on the sat-nav, but the woman's whiny instructions kept jolting Zaf awake. Lucas glanced over at him. He was sleeping lightly, his face tense and hurt. His injuries were bad, but not life threatening. Besides, Harry said he would contact Lucas with the residence of a doctor if Zaf's state deteriorated. Lucas tried not to look too closely at the burns and scars tattooed all over him, swallowing a lump in his throat and returning his eyes to the road.

The safe house that they finally arrived at looked dreary and uninhabited, with moss clinging adamantly to the brickwork and spider webs slung lazily across the window frames. It was such a disappointing little dwelling that Lucas felt bad for waking Zaf to tell him that they had arrived. Zaf stretched his arms a little and groaned as his bones clicked. Lucas' eyes flitted over to him and rested on a different scar.

"What's that?" asked Lucas, his voice tense.

"The numbers?" Zaf rubbed his thumb across the tiny string of digits engraved in his forearm. "I remembered them from before I was captured. And that was however many years ago, and I could still remember. I figured they might be important."

"I'll ask Harry," responded Lucas, getting out of the car and pulling out his phone, but there was no signal.

Lucas headed to the other side of the car to assist the struggling Zaf in getting to his feet. Lucas was practically holding him up, but the other man was so malnourished that it didn't require much strength.

Lucas knocked on the door, twice, solidly. An owl hooted shrilly in the distance. Trees shook in the icy wind and Lucas felt Zaf shivering. It was then that he noticed that Zaf's clothes were completely wrecked, soaked with blood and dirt and ripped to shreds. It wasn't as if Lucas expected to see him in a Savile Row suit, but he felt inconsiderate for not thinking to bring a change of clothes for his freezing friend.

The sound of a branch snapping broke the eerie silence of the night and both men's heads turned around swiftly, eyes scanning the darkness. Lucas knocked again, more resolutely this time, and eventually a man answered the door. His face was hollow and unwelcoming, his accent thick and his English broken. He directed Lucas and Zaf to the lounge area and said had he had been sleeping and would now return to his room upstairs. Lucas scowled at his uselessness and the way that he had hardly acknowledged that Zaf was struggling to stand.

"You need food," said Lucas efficiently, heading to a room next to the lounge that he could only assume was a kitchen and checking the cupboards, finding only a half-eaten packet of biscuits.

"What do you want to drink?" called Lucas.

"Got any single malt whiskey?" quipped Zaf. Lucas was surprised at his chipper response but it made him smile.

"Afraid not, mate. Only water or tea."

"Tea, please. It's freezing in here," replied Zaf, lowering himself down onto the sofa.

Lucas rummaged through his rucksack as the kettle whistled, pulling out a small packet of painkillers. Zaf had been putting on a brave face and hadn't once complained about the agony he must be in, and Lucas found it admirable. He knew exactly how much torture wounds hurt. Lucas bit his lip hard as he crushed the pill into Zaf's mug, willing himself to brush aside memories of Russia so that he could tend to his friend.

Lucas handed Zaf the steaming mug of tea and took a seat opposite him on the other sofa, taking a few seconds to look at their surroundings whilst splitting open the biscuits. There was a set of French windows displaying the darkness and responsible for the chill of the room. Lucas stood to draw the thick curtains, walking past an unlit fireplace topped with a ticking gold clock and a few candles. His feet scraped a combination of woollen rug and uneven wooden flooring. The walls were an unattractive beige colour. Everything about the place suggested abandon and unwelcomeness.

Lucas knelt down beside the fireplace, turning it on and watching a flame leap across the stack of logs, breaking into several clusters of golden fire. Lucas sat back down, satisfied with where everything was in the room. There were three potential escape routes and the creaky floor would warn of any intruders. Lucas shrugged off his jacket and handed it to Zaf, who offered a small smile.

"So, aren't you going to ask?" questioned Zaf after they had each taken ten synchronised sips of tea in silence.

"Ask what?" asked Lucas, opting for an eleventh sip of the drink.

Zaf shrugged, dunking his third biscuit into his tea."Anything. How did I get here? What did they want from me? What's my favourite pizza topping?"

Lucas bit back a smile at the last one. "You can begin the casual interrogation if you wish."

"Okay," said Zaf. "Where's this jacket from? It looks like one a funeral director might wear."

Lucas laughed aloud this time. "You know how finicky Harry gets about formal attire in the workplace."

Zaf's forehead crinkled a little. "Harry. How is he? Last time I saw him he was ranting at me for nicking post-it notes off his desk."

Lucas' eyes widened. "You took Harry's post-it notes?"

Zaf caught on instantly, holding his hands up in surrender. "Look, I'm sorry mate, I know I shouldn't have. Please don't tell anyone."

Lucas ran a hand through his hair. "I think I'll have to pass this on to a higher authority." The pair kept up the pretence of serious faces for a few seconds longer before breaking into smiles.

Their casual conversation and exchange of banter was surprising to Lucas, as he had expected a torture victim and man who had been held for years to be broken and terrified – he certainly had been after Russia. But Lucas was also put at ease by Zaf's easygoing nature, although he knew it to be a facade.

The atmosphere was relaxed now, and Lucas was regaining confidence that he had control of this operation. But the pair was unaware of the phone call that was taking place upstairs.

"Fahir, I've got them. What happens now?"


	9. Chapter 9

Zaf's sleep was broken that night for several reasons. The weather was harsh – a fierce wind ripped through the trees and clattered branches against the French windows. Zaf imagined how cold he would be if he were still in that cell, curled up in the corner. At least he now had the luxury of a little warmth, with a multicoloured throw from the sofa and Lucas' jacket, and a cushion tucked beneath his head.

He had slept a little – Zaf suspected that Lucas had slipped a drug into his tea – but the ticking clock on the mantel told him it was 2am when he awoke suddenly, swallowing a scream that had risen in his throat. He had dreamt of his captors looming, an iron rod sizzling into his skin. Zaf rubbed a purpling burn that spread across his forearm and winced.

Lucas, opposite him on the other sofa, had his feet propped up on the coffee table, his eyes closed, a frown etched into his forehead. Zaf was unsure as to whether he was sleeping.

Zaf found it difficult to close his eyes in this strange environment, afraid of what might be lurking out of sight if he were to sleep. This fear nagged at him until he sat up and stumbled from the sofa, checking that all of the windows were closed and the doors were locked. The kitchen was empty, a sliver of moonlight emphasising its isolated state. The tap dripped a steady beat of water. Zaf twisted it shut, catching a glance of a silver knife rack illuminated by the moon, metal glinting. He looked away from the sharp blades and went back into the lounge.

Zaf hadn't stopped thinking about his rescue. At the time he was overwhelmed with relief that it had worked, but this simple delight had turned to worry. It had been planned well by Lucas, who was obviously skilled, but his captors had always been so alert, so ready. Zaf had once witnessed a prisoner trying to escape and heard bones crunching as one of the guards crushed the helpless man into the ground.

Why would it take them so long to get into Zaf's cell and stop him? Why did the one that followed him not chase the car?

Zaf's unease was turning swiftly to panic. He bit down hard on his lip and tried to take slow, steady breaths, his mind flitting back and forth. The panic of the guards. The explosion.

"Shit," Zaf whispered into his hands, rubbing a palm across his eyes to dislodge any sleepiness.

"Lucas," he hissed, nudging the other man with an outstretched foot.

Lucas' eyes snapped open instantaneously and he sat upright. "What's wrong?"

"One of the guards said 'Get this bloody door open now' when I escaped," Zaf explained.

"So?" asked Lucas hesitantly.

"It was put on. I thought I was hearing things, you know, after the blast. My ears were ringing. But I swore I heard laughter." Zaf wringed his hands. "Lucas, I think they wanted me to escape so they could find us here. They knew all along that you planned to get me out last night."

Zaf watched Lucas' face morph into a frown of equal parts of fear and anger.

"Could they have planted a tracker on you?" Lucas whispered steadily.

"I-I don't think so. You?"

Lucas sat back slowly, realisation dawning. "My backpack," he mouthed to Zaf. Lucas stood and brought it from the kitchen into the lounge, taking each item out of it carefully. Zaf noticed the small packet of pills as his eyes brushed the contents. He looked away subtly, searching for the bug.

A tiny black dot clung to the edge of a file. Lucas lifted it between his thumb and forefinger and crushed it, then placed it on the floor and dug his heel into it for good measure. Zaf's eyes drifted from the now inactive device to the file on which it had lurked. He spotted his name.

"Zaf," said Lucas calmly. "If you're right, then this man will try to kill us. And that device could have been a tracker, or a listener. Either way, it won't take them long to figure out that we know."

"We need to leave." Zaf rose to his feet but Lucas grabbed his forearm.

"No, they'll know something's up. They'll want to bide their time. This guy"- Lucas gestured upstairs to the sounds of snoring - "won't be the main person running it; he'll have to wait for further instructions from his boss. We need to act as if we don't know _anything_."

"He'll kill us," Zaf responded, his eyes wide. "Not just me, he'll get you too." Zaf ran a hand through his hair. "I should have stayed there," he mumbled.

"No." Lucas' voice was strong. "We'll both get out of here. We can take turns sleeping tonight; one of us can keep watch in case our friend does decide to move. In the morning I'll go out into the town to get a signal and call Harry, and get surveillance on the people at the prison. Okay?"

Zaf hesitated. "Okay," he said, even though his voice was trembling.

"Try to sleep," instructed Lucas, waiting for Zaf to lie back down on the sofa before moving his watchful gaze away. Zaf's eyes were fixated on the clock on the mantel, ticking mercilessly, as he counted down the seconds until dawn. Neither man was going to sleep with a killer in the house.


	10. Chapter 10

**Thanks for continued reading &amp; reviews. This chapter was necessary to keep the story going– just remember that nothing is ever as it seems in Spooks...**

Lucas kept his eyes wide open until a gentle streak of sunlight tickled the inside of the curtains. He rose, rolling his shoulders and ruffling the hair at the back of his head with a hand, walking to reveal some light for the room. He drew the curtains back as quietly as possible, but still Zaf rolled over onto his side, shielding his eyes against the sun's brightness and grumbling.

"Tea?" asked Lucas. Zaf mumbled in agreement, pulling himself into a sitting position.

Lucas clattered the mugs and spoons a little louder than necessary, whistling to himself. As he had hoped, he heard stirrings from upstairs, and then the firm, fast footsteps of the man making his way downstairs. Lucas caught him in the reflection of the knife rack eyeing Zaf before reaching the kitchen.

"Morning," said Lucas brightly, his face stretched into a smile. "Tea?"

"No," replied the gravelly voice, then as a side thought, "Thank you."

"No problem." Lucas turned away, spinning the spoons in the mugs of tea, the metal tinkling irritably against the sides. At least it masked the heavy silence that had descended on the house.

The man shifted from foot to foot, unsure of what to make of Lucas. He eventually sat down at the kitchen table, dragging a hand through his shoulder-length hair and clicking his knuckles.

"How long have you been in Turkey?" asked Lucas politely, turning round to face him.

"A while," returned the stranger. His voice was monotonous, his accent strong. He jerked his head towards the lounge. "How's your friend?"

"Pretty run down," said Lucas. "But he'll be okay."

"How long are you staying?" the man asked slyly. Lucas didn't take the bait, offering a vague: "We'll see how it goes" as a way of response before taking a mug of tea to Zaf.

_You okay? _Lucas mouthed to Zaf, making sure the man couldn't see. Zaf nodded, taking a brief sip of the tea.

"Where's the best place to get a signal?" asked Lucas, returning to the kitchen and showing his phone to the man.

"Just across the street," the man grumbled as a reply. Lucas nodded curtly and headed outside, the door slamming audibly behind him.

The man made his way into the lounge, taking a seat on the sofa opposite Zaf.

"Can I get you anything?" he asked.

Zaf looked over to him. "No, I'm fine, thanks." Zaf's tone had been casual and friendly, but his head was spinning. He had agreed with Lucas that he was stable enough to fight the man off if he tried anything while Lucas went to call Harry. But the truth was that Zaf was struggling to stay calm. The man opposite him was making small talk but just biding his time. Plotting how best to kill them.

This man had talked to his captors, associated with the people who tortured him incessantly with smiles painted on their faces. Zaf swallowed and didn't make eye contact, instead trying to get the man out of the room: "Actually, have you got any more blankets? It was cold last night."

"Sure," said the man, walking slowly to the stairs. Zaf watched him until he was out of sight, throwing aside the blanket on his lap and getting to his feet, feeling a dull ache spread through his body. He clenched and unclenched his fists gently, watching a fresh pool of blood escape from the scratches across his knuckles.

The soft sound of a blanket being thrown on the sofa made Zaf turn around too quickly. The man raised his eyebrows a little: "Here you go."

"Thanks," said Zaf, his voice horribly uneven. He coughed once, going to sit back down.

_Where the hell was Lucas? _ He swore to Zaf that he would be a minute or so maximum – he just needed to call in a status report. Zaf drew in steady breaths and tried to tell himself that Lucas would be back soon.

"Why are you so injured?" asked the man.

Zaf shifted. Should he lie? Whatever he said, he knew it would cause a sharp wash of memories. Zaf swallowed hard.

"I got beaten up," he said, with as much casualness as he could muster.

"Well, it won't hurt for long," said the man, in a way that could be interpreted to mean that Zaf's wounds would heal. But as Zaf moved his eyes from the floor to the face of the man he swore he saw a glimmer of malice in his eyes.

Zaf rose again. "My friend, he-"Zaf's voice was cracking- "should be back any minute."

"Would you like some more tea?" the stranger replied with a tight smile.

"Please." Zaf was desperate to not have to look at him anymore; to get this vile person out of sight. But then he realised that letting him out of sight was a terrible idea...

...

Lucas dialled for the third time, pacing the hot streets. The reception was awful – he had reached Harry only once and could hardly hear what he was saying. Lucas sloped back to the house again, attempting another call. Mercifully, he heard Harry's voice: "Lucas, what's going on?"  
"They knew about the escape plan. We need somewhere safe to go, tonight."

Lucas was so close to the house, nearing the cracked wooden door, when he heard the thud. His eyes were drawn instantly to the blade that had struck cleanly through the wood.

His feet pounded. Lucas opened the door with a kick. The man held another knife, poised, seconds away from throwing it directly at Zaf.

Lucas yanked the other knife from the door and pushed it into the man's back with murderous efficiency. He choked, crumbling, dead within seconds, but he had already thrown the other knife.

"What the hell is going on?" boomed Harry voice from the phone. Lucas was frozen to the spot for a second before jolting into action.

"Shit." He went to Zaf quickly, trying to pinpoint the wound with his eyes, but a steady spread of blood was masking Zaf's shirt and the blanket he had been clutching.

"Harry, send me directions for this doctor, now," Lucas barked, slipping his phone back into his pocket before going over to the body of the man and tugging off his jacket, bringing it over to Zaf to use to compress the wound.

"Can you walk?" Lucas asked Zaf, whose face was rapidly draining of colour.

"Maybe," Zaf replied, his voice hoarse. He moved slightly and instantly crushed a hand to the wound on his side, his face split with agony.

"The car's close. We need to get you to a doctor," Lucas insisted, supporting most of the other man's weight and reaching for his backpack.

"Okay," murmured Zaf, biting down on his lip and squeezing his eyes closed.

It was an effort made worse by the stifling heat and the uneven paving slabs, and took several minutes to bundle Zaf into the car and for Lucas to receive the directions from Harry. The doctor's house was about twenty minutes from here. Lucas didn't honestly know if Zaf would still be conscious by the time they arrived.

"Keep it compressed," instructed Lucas, his tone desperate. Zaf nodded weakly and rested his head back against the leather seat.

The tyres sputtered up dust from the road as Lucas manoeuvred the car as quickly as he was able, oblivious to the occasional speed limit that they encountered. He reached into his pocket, other hand still clasping the wheel, and speed-dialled Harry.

"If you don't tell me what the bloody hell is going on right now Lucas, I'll put you on a flight to a country you've never heard of so fast that your head will spin."

"The guy at the supposed 'safe' tried to kill Zaf. I got him before he could finish the job, but I was still too late. He's been stabbed."

"Good God. He's been through enough already. How is he?"

"Bad," replied Lucas, not trying to disguise the worry in his voice. He glanced back over at Zaf.

"_Shit_."Lucas hit the acceleration. "Zaf, wake up!" he yelled, reaching out to shake his shoulder.

"Lucas, _talk to me_."  
"Harry, he's not breathing."


	11. Chapter 11

**Thanks for sticking with the story. As a way of apology for the somewhat cruel ending I gave the last instalment, here is a longer chapter which I hope you enjoy **

Despite Harry's orders to 'get some rest', Lucas found he was unable to close his eyes for more than a few seconds before snapping them back open to check on Zaf.

He was sleeping peacefully at last. His face had a healthier glow now, amongst the scars. His breathing was steadier than Lucas had heard it before.

It had taken Lucas two minutes to reach the doctor's residence after discovering that Zaf had stopped breathing. It seemed like a lot longer, and he kept switching glances from the road to Zaf, back and forth. The friend he had just made was already slipping away.

The elderly doctor, in spite of his age, hurried down to the car and with Lucas carried Zaf into the house. The doctor managed to revive him but told Lucas that, had that time been four or five minutes instead of two, there would have been a great chance of permanent brain damage.

Lucas had left the room in which Zaf had been taken after being reassured that he was going to make it, heading out of the house which he had barely glanced at into the vast stretch of grass and patio that came with it. Lucas for once felt sure of their protection. The doctor was called Kerem Polat, a well-respected man in the community and loyal to MI5 after they tried to help his son who was involved in an accident a few years ago. He was very rich, and his home had gates and guards, and thankfully a clear phone signal. Lucas updated Harry with Zaf's status and headed back inside. They had arrived near midday, but now it was early evening and the sun had gone into hiding, replaced with a night air cool enough to dot goosebumps across Lucas' arms.

Dr Polat was leant over the stove, nursing some kind of broth that filled the kitchen with a warm, savoury scent. He turned to Lucas and smiled.

"For your friend. And of course, you're welcome to some too," he said. His voice was gentle and calm, and his expression held a kindness that made Lucas feel comforted.

"Thank you," said Lucas, taking a seat at the mahogany table in the centre of the kitchen, finally taking in his surroundings. The kitchen was large but cosy, with light orange walls holding artful sketches and oil paintings and photographs. Upon one wall hung a huge array of golden saucepans of every diameter and depth. The windowsill was covered in jostling coloured jugs, each containing a different flower or herb. A glossy painted bowl on the side held wooden and metal cooking instruments. The main feature of the room was the table at which Lucas sat, which could seat twelve easily, each chair with ornate armrests and equipped with a plush embroidered cushion. The whole place was rustic and welcoming.

Dr Polat scooped several spoonfuls of the delicious-smelling broth into a china bowl with a blue rim and searched for a spoon in one of the drawers. He then ladled out another bowl, handing it to Lucas with a hunk of bread of the side.

"Thank you," said Lucas again, realising this was the first proper meal he had eaten in days.

"Come with me. I will try and see if your friend is well enough to eat a little. I'm sure he's keen to see you."

Lucas nodded and smiled but felt a knot twist in his stomach. Would Zaf be relieved that they had both survived the ordeal? Or would he look at Lucas with contempt, as he had escaped unscathed but left Zaf to take the knife?

Lucas carried his bowl into the lounge area and sat down in a plush armchair, balancing the broth on his knee. The walls of this room were again decorated extravagantly, this time with photographs. Lucas peered at each one, puzzled, as they seemed to all be very similar. They all depicted the sun, a dazzling focal point, with the trees and sky as a border. In some the sky was light and airy; in other it was peppered with clouds. The trees were different too – sometimes thinned and faint, sometimes blossoming with green leaves, red leaves, or no leaves at all.

Dr Polat saw Lucas looking at the photographs and smiled. "Every morning I take a photograph of the sun rising from the same place in my back garden. It's a very beautiful thing to see. I like to have a record that I witnessed something so magnificent."He smiled gently and gestured for Lucas to stand next to him by one of the walls. Dr Polat pulled up the corner of one photograph, revealing several others underneath. Lucas caught the date on the photo right at the back.

"Wow," said Lucas, and he meant it. The idea was so simple, but it gave a stunning result. It was also nice to see something that was taken for granted be given a positive, artistic slant.

Lucas returned to his chair and sipped a spoonful of the hot broth. The flavours were simple but delicious and Lucas felt it warming him up.

The doctor knelt down beside the sofa on which Zaf was asleep. He felt his wrist and face, nodding to himself. Then he gently shook Zaf's shoulder, waiting for his eyes to open. They did so sleepily, assessing the surroundings fearfully at first but then somewhat more comforted when they fell on Lucas, who smiled reassuringly and gestured to the broth that Dr Polat was holding up for him.

Lucas watched Zaf swallow the broth slowly and noted the doctor's patient and caring nature. After Zaf had finished eating he checked the stitches on his side and some of the other more serious wounds that Zaf had acquired over the years of torture. He had applied a balm to the burns to bring down swelling and reduce the harsh colours to a softer skin tone. Zaf's cuts had been cleaned and re-stitched from where the captors had done a shabby repair. Lucas knew this personally to be a horrible technique: a torturer would inflict a wound that causes heavy bleeding and then stitch it up again so the victim wouldn't bleed to death, thus stopping their sadistic, pain-inflicting regime. Lucas shuddered at the thought, dragging his eyes away from the gash on Zaf's shoulder that ran all the way down his back.

The doctor was satisfied with his patient's recovery, encouraging Zaf to sleep in order to gain more strength. He then went over to where Lucas was still sitting on the other side of the room, pulling up a chair.

"He will be fine. The stitches on his side are healing nicely and I've treated his other wounds for infection. He'll need to rest for a couple of days before he's walking around properly again."

Lucas nodded. "I can't even begin to repay you for what you've done."

The doctor smiled a warm smile and said, "You have no need to repay me at all. Although I am curious to know his name. I don't think he'll be happy with the permanent title of 'patient'."

Lucas felt himself smile. "His name's Zaf."

Dr Polat nodded thoughtfully. "Zaf. Short for Zafar?"

"Yes," replied Lucas, looking over to Zaf. He was sleeping again already, his head buried in soft pillows.

"Harry told me that he has been through a lot and could do with several helpings of my broth," said the doctor lightly.

Lucas laughed a little. "It is delicious. Thank you."

"An old family recipe. I have made you up a room just down the corridor. Shall I show it to you?"

"Please." Lucas stood, placing the empty bowl and spoon on a side table and following the doctor down a corridor painted a light shade of lavender. It was only a few seconds away from the lounge and Lucas was comforted by the fact that Zaf was not far away.

The room was small and well-kept. The floor, like the rest of the house, was a smooth wood. The walls were a new colour – a light green. Each room seemed to be painted a different, relaxing shade, each one soothing to the eye and adding a personal touch to the place.

"If Zaf's condition changes I will let you know. I will keep a close eye."

"Thank you, Doctor," said Lucas.

He smiled again. "Please, call me Kerem. We are friends now Lucas, I hope. Sleep well."

Lucas opened a door in the room curiously, which led to a small bathroom of his own. He pulled the tap, releasing a stream of fresh, cool water. Lucas gathered a scoop and smeared it into his face and around his neck, washing away the dust and dirt he had gathered from the day. He then gently prised open the door of a wardrobe to investigate the contents, revealing clean clothes and extra pillows.

He untucked the duvets and kicked off his shoes, lying down on the bed and allowing himself to close his eyes. But it wasn't long before the shrill sound of his phone snapped him back to full consciousness.

"Hello?" Lucas grumbled.

"Sounds like someone got out of the wrong side of bed," replied the voice.

Lucas froze, feeling his muscles tense and his eyebrows furrow in confusion.

"Actually, I just got into bed," he replied slowly, waiting for a response, another chance to reassess the voice.

"I didn't particularly want to know that - I'm hoping your next reply won't give details as to what it is exactly that you choose to wear or not wear whilst you sleep," she replied smoothly.

"You're supposed to be dead," was all Lucas could think to say.

"I've already established thanks to my impeccable interpretation of people that you're tired, but now you're being rude?"

"Ros," said Lucas, once, his voice low.

"Lucas," she returned, sounding casual. He could picture the amused smirk on her face.

"You're supposed to be dead," he repeated.

"Dying's incredibly boring," she quipped. "And besides, I still hated my kitchen. Couldn't die selfishly and leave it to remain in a state of minimalist snobbery."

Lucas felt the briefest smirk on his lips, which soon vanished on account of his sheer confusion. "I saw the explosion. How did you survive it?"

She sighed as if the solution was staring him in the face. "First rule about buildings used for top-secret government associations – include an underground bunker in the construction plans. Always useful if a politician forgets his toast and burns the place down."

"And the home secretary?"

"Fine. Enough compensation to ensure he never has to work again. Living in Corfu now, I seem to recall."

"Why did you not come back to us?" Lucas asked, sounding almost accusative.

"This may surprise you, Lucas, but I have a social calendar outside of Harry Pearce's umbrella of authority."

The way that Ros used Harry's last name sounded oddly formal, as if she was finished with that life now and wanted to stay distanced from it. Lucas felt his annoyance rising.

"Why are you calling now? Why not three years ago, specifically, before we'd had your funeral? Your second funeral, I seem to remember. A word of reassurance that you were still alive wouldn't have gone amiss."

"Oh, well I did that for my first funeral. Only Adam knew. I tried to sneak away unseen, but Jo noticed me. Kind of ruins the anonymity of a new life if you're caught before you've even reached the airport."

"Why are you calling, Ros?" Lucas was tired of her elaborately facetious responses. He had always smirked at her dry humour but right now he wished for once that she would be sincere about her feelings.

"How's Zaf?" she asked, hesitating on his name slightly as if she wasn't used to saying it.

"He'll be fine," replied Lucas, mirroring the toneless voice with which she had spoken.

She paused for the briefest of moments. "Good," she said quietly, and then quickly, efficiently: "Harry will call tomorrow."

"Ros-"Lucas started, interrupted by the bleep that told him she had hung up.

Lucas placed his phone purposefully on the table next to the bed and rolled onto his side so it was out of sight.


	12. Chapter 12

**Thanks for reading everyone, hope you've had a lovely weekend! **

The house was huge enough to be intimidating, but Zaf miraculously felt himself embracing the fear whole-heartedly. For once, it wasn't the crushing kind of fear that gnawed at his skin and made him feel sick with dread - it was more of a curiosity. Zaf knew that when he limped down the corridor it wouldn't lead to a room of sizzling metal rods or chains. The house was just room upon room of splendour and comfort.

Zaf felt the contrast between prisoner and patient so strongly. Having pain inflicted, and having pain treated. He had begun to remember the feeling of a smile.

Of course, there were the memories. The nightmares. The scars. But Zaf felt that exploring the house tentatively on recovering legs to be an adventure to embrace, and a good way to push away any harsh memories that rose up.

He had found this to be an effective tactic over the years. Zaf preferred to be calm about something. There was something about looking calm and having other people think you looked calm which eventually results in you being calm yourself. Zaf applied this to many things, from school studies (which he cared more about than he let on), to first joining the service.

Zaf thought a lot about the service during resting hours (Dr Polat was thrilled at Zaf's eagerness to be up and about but insisted that he slept when possible at regular points of the day to sustain his strength). He sipped another bowl of broth and thought about the day he'd gone for his training assessment. He'd driven the roads smoothly and quickly in his sleek convertible, attracting several approving looks as he stepped out of the vehicle and locked it with a smirk and a smooth flick of the button on his key. He had flirted with the receptionist and smiled at the evaluators, but all the while he actually felt quite tense. But Zaf threw himself into the tasks so much that there wasn't any room for worrying. He knew that he wasn't great at all of the things he had been handed, but hoped that his confidence and willingness to try would stand him in good stead. And the fact that he scored full marks on the driving was the cherry on the cake.

After spending time at Six, he had been called up by Adam Carter whom he had met briefly when he worked on the North African desk. He was a sound guy and Zaf was more than happy to help around Five for a bit. Turns out, Section D was his dream job. He took the role (and the desk next to Ruth, as he had requested) and never looked back.

Until capture.

Zaf felt a harsh wave of nausea just thinking the word and placed down the bowl of broth, half eaten. But he knew he would have to think about it and talk about it and eventually accept it, just like everything else.

For the first few months he was obviously terrified – physically experiencing torture and imprisonment weren't exactly covered on the recruitment programme. But a little shred of him felt that he could stand another burn or cut because he'd be rescued soon.

Even when he was sold on and ended up in Northern Pakistan, he didn't give up on the team. Even when he overheard their plot of sending a decoy body so that MI5 would stop digging their noses in, Zaf knew that they would see through it and carry on looking for him.

But they didn't.

Zaf swallowed a lump in his throat and blinked hard. He knew he shouldn't feel like this. The service didn't owe him anything. The team didn't owe him anything. And he had no idea of how they tried to find him. But a part of him wished they might have tried harder. Of course, MI5 had priorities. They had to think of civilians over officers. They would have tried to find Zaf, and then been sent the body and accepted that it was him, whilst Zaf was actually subjected to further years of terror and torture, now knowing that help was never going to arrive.

But then there was Lucas, and the escape, and now freedom.

Lucas. Escape. Freedom.

Zaf hadn't yet plucked up the courage to ask Lucas about how they found out that he was still alive. His colleague had done so much already that he didn't want to burden him further by asking awkward questions.

Zaf picked up the bowl of broth again, feeling horrible and selfish to even think of leaving it when he was still barely used to having food in front of him. A memory of a pub roast at The George flitted back to him and planted a smile on his face. Zaf missed London. He wondered when he would get to go back home, but again didn't want to ask. Instead, he thought about Lucas.

When did he join the team? And who was on the team now?

Zaf felt a shudder to think about any of them getting hurt. Adam, Jo, Ros. Harry.

He switched his thinking back to Lucas. He thought he was probably a little older than him – at least, he looked more experienced. Zaf wondered what role he was – probably senior officer. But... what about Adam?

Zaf squeezed his eyes shut for a few seconds, trying to discourage a couple of tears from spilling. He vowed to not think about the team until he was back at The Grid. He would see who was there. He would find out about the ones who weren't and read their file and make his peace with them.

He opened his eyes again and squinted a little at the afternoon sun. Zaf had always enjoyed warm weather, but now could only think of sweltering days in the cell. He suddenly longed for the brisk chill of a bustling London day.

Lucas interrupted his thinking by striding in, talking into his phone.

"Why don't you tell him yourself?" he said, handing the phone to Zaf. Zaf frowned a little in confusion and held the phone to his ear gently.

"Hello?" Zaf said, his voice faltering. He coughed and tried again. "Sorry. Hello."

"Zaf. How are you?"

"Harry!" Zaf couldn't keep the simple delight from his voice at hearing the other man. It was strange really, that he took his boss for granted. Harry was a great guy and Zaf felt a little intimidated to be working for him at first, covering it up with devious tricks and jokes which he hoped Harry came to accept as a part of his personality.

"And I'm fine," said Zaf, responding to his question, albeit with an unconvincing voice.

"That's good to hear." Harry didn't dwell of Zaf's obvious lie about his wellbeing. "How do you feel about me buying you and Lucas a round at The George on your return?"

"That sounds like an offer I can't refuse," Zaf laughed a little. "When?"

"How about tomorrow night?"

"Tomorrow?" Zaf's tone was incredulous.

"Yes. Your flights are all booked. I'll look forward to seeing you back on The Grid."

The call ended, but Zaf's smile didn't.


	13. Chapter 13

**Thanks to all who have read so far. If you feel like leaving a review that'd be much appreciated – I enjoy reading them and will try to act upon feedback given! I watched episodes 1&amp;2 of Series 4 today and gained an idea which I incorporated into this chapter which I hope you enjoy.  
**

Lucas didn't like flying.

It wasn't the turbulence or the ascent or descent that he didn't like – rather, he felt these to be the more interesting parts of an otherwise completely mundane experience.

The whole affair was just _tedious_ – checking in, waiting, exploring shop after shop of the same chocolates and aftershaves and feigning interest. Sitting in a hardback plastic chair waiting for your flight for hours, with eavesdropping on an inevitable argument by a couple incapable of talking quietly being the only source of entertainment. Finally being called for your flight and shuffling at an appallingly slow rate, being welcomed onto the plane and without a doubt getting the seat next to the elderly man that snores.

It was fair to say that Lucas was cynical about the whole ordeal. He slipped his sunglasses on to avoid eye contact and kept his head down, which luckily came naturally in his line of work.

Lucas noted that Zaf on the other hand was surprisingly chipper. Walking with crutches and still looking like hell, he attracted looks of sympathy which he combated effortlessly with a cheeky grin or flirty comment, proving especially effective with the air stewardesses who seemed to check on him more than any other passenger. Lucas expected to find this sort of trait irritating and childish, but Zaf's upbeat nature was rather infectious.

The flight should have lasted for about four hours, but due to an incompetent flyer misplacing his passport the plane left an hour later than it should have done. Lucas had gritted his teeth and re-read the newspaper he had bought several times despite the fact that he had a photographic memory. Zaf was in the seat in front, content with scanning the films on offer on the tiny tv on the back of each chair. Lucas was grateful for the spare seat to his right on which he propped his backpack.

The only thing he could occupy his time with was thinking about the last couple of days.

Would Harry want him back on the team after this? Or would he be sent on another mission abroad, leaving Zaf to be welcomed back like a hero?

Lucas contemplated whether this would make him feel bitter, but he actually felt calm. Even if he was left to do odd jobs abroad, it had been his fault. Zaf hadn't deserved the years of torture and was a team member that no-one would take for granted again.

The plane was bobbing through the clouds now, but it was too grey for it to be worthwhile glancing out of the window, and even then the elderly man to his left had his head leant against it, snoring infuriatingly. Lucas winced and slipped on some headphones, deciding to scan through the various films on offer, none of which caught his interest. He had never really been a fan of movies. Sure, they were okay in a time-passing, mind-numbing kind of way, but they were mostly hopelessly romantic or ridiculously dramatic, neither of which Lucas particularly warmed to. He selected the least daunting looking of the slim selection on offer and focused his eyes on the screen, but it wasn't long before he was interrupted. An air hostess stood next to him, a long curtain of dark hair falling around her shoulders. Lucas looked up and felt a stab of recognition and then a wave of sadness, but the girl's dark eyes were unaware of the sorrow he felt.

"Have you had a look at the menu yet?" she enquired politely. Her accent was soft and told that she was Turkish.

"No," Lucas grumbled, fearing he sounded rude. He tried to compose himself, reaching for the menu in the pocket of the seat in front. "The chicken stew sounds great," he tried enthusiastically, although ending up sounding a tad sarcastic. "Thanks." He checked her name badge as his eyes travelled back to the screen just to be certain.

She was called Ayla – Lucas thought her name to be rather beautiful. But despite the almost identical height and build and dark glossy hair and brown eyes, she wasn't Maya. The two women shared so many physical characteristics that it made Lucas flinch. He watched her head forward and ask for Zaf's order. He flirted, she laughed. But her laugh wasn't Maya's. When she walked, her gait wasn't the same.

Lucas knew that he had to stop living in the past, but it felt so much safer than what he had to face now.

That was, until Zaf unbuckled his seatbelt despite the sign instructing him not to do so and dropped Lucas' backpack, sitting on the seat to his right and saying: "I think I'm as bored as you look."

Lucas smiled a little at this. "Well, plane journeys don't provide the same level of adrenaline as a mission, exactly."

Zaf grinned infectiously. "I've missed that. Y'know, even surveillance. You get to drink lots of coffee and eat countless cereal bars, and just as your eyes drift shut the suspect moves, and you have to chase or tail and it's worth the twenty hour wait."

Lucas laughed. "Is it ever worth twenty hours?"

Zaf shrugged. "A guy we waited twenty two for once turned out to be plotting to leave a bomb outside Thames House. I'd say we were wise to wait for that one."

"Maybe so," Lucas smirked.

Ayla the air hostess reappeared, although this time Lucas fixed his gaze to the floor.

"Sir, I'll need to ask you to go back to your seat," she instructed Zaf, but softly, reaching to put Lucas' coat in the overhead compartment – his backpack, however, he was keen to hold on to, unwilling to run the risk of picking up another bug.

"Oh, I'm ever so sorry," said Zaf gently, offering a tiny smile as a way of apology and scooting past her, tripping slightly, snagging her waist.

"Sorry," he murmured again, looking up from under his eyelashes. She smiled and said: "No problem at all." When he had finally settled back in his seat Lucas noticed Ayla scurrying off to the front, whispering to another air hostess and giggling. Zaf turned around and winked at Lucas theatrically.

Lucas smirked. Maybe this flight could be simple, even mildly enjoyable. Eating plain food, watching a movie, joking with Zaf.

Lucas didn't sleep at all on the flight – frankly, he wanted to keep an eye on Zaf. When they got back to Thames House it would be a shock for him. Several times Lucas went to tap his friend on the shoulder and then thought otherwise. He didn't really want to tell him the details of the team on the flight, especially that Adam had been killed years ago – Lucas knew that Adam and Zaf had been close friends. But as they edged closer and closer to Heathrow, Lucas felt guilty for keeping his friend in the dark.

Lucas nudged Zaf's shoulder. "Look mate, when we get back... the team's not the same," Lucas blurted. It didn't sound the way he had intended, but then again it wasn't worth sugar-coating. Zaf's face was still cool, but his deep brown eyes dissolved into something sadder.

"Yeah, I know," said Zaf apprehensively.

"I just thought I'd let you know," continued Lucas, although Zaf was already looking uncomfortable.

"I'd rather just find out when we get there," Zaf replied shortly.

"You sure?"

"Yeah. Thanks mate." Zaf turned back around, but not before Lucas caught the worry that had spread across his face. Once again, Lucas couldn't help but pity him.

Lucas tried to prevent his shoulders from tensing, tried to refrain from cracking his knuckles, but he still felt nervous. Mostly for Zaf, but also, selfishly, for himself.

It hadn't gone smoothly at all. Sure, he'd got Zaf out, but also got him stabbed. He was part of the pain behind Zaf's eyes that wouldn't go away, no matter how hard Zaf tried to disguise his hurt. Harry no doubt would ask questions as to how Lucas got bugged – however, it had been Harry that directed them to the safe house equipped with killer. Lucas was eager to hear Harry's explanation for that fiasco.

Lucas watched the map that had appeared on the screen, showing the plane hovering near to Heathrow. He suddenly felt relieved to be returning to Thames House, even if his stay was not permanent. Zaf, in front, had also noticeably perked up – he had sat up straighter and relaxed his shoulders.

There was another person glad for the arrival. Ayla smiled as Zaf exited the plane – he interpreted it as flirty and he winked in return. She smiled a little more at Lucas, however, who sullenly dropped his gaze. But Ayla didn't mind. She watched him until he was out of side, his black silhouette blending in with the crowds. His coat was well-cut and expensive. And also no longer his own.

Ayla had smirked as she took away Lucas' coat to helpfully store in the overhead compartments, stuffing it in a hidden section and replacing it with an exact replica with a twist. Tiny microphones were stitched into the coat pockets of the unsuspecting spy, so advanced that even MI5 security wouldn't pick up on it.

It was lucky that Fahir had gained so much information on this spy, thanks to the listening devices and surveillance he had organised. As an air hostess, Ayla knew London very well and could arrange for a contact who worked there to rustle up a jacket to match the one Lucas wore in a photo that Fahir had taken.

Ayla didn't know what would happen to Lucas, but Fahir told her that it would be great for the cause.

_What cause?_ she had questioned. Fahir had only smiled.

She didn't need to know the details of what she had been caught up in. All she knew was that Fahir had promised her money, enough money worth swapping an MI5 agent's jacket for one with microphones and potentially sending him to his death.

As the last passenger left, Ayla wiped away the compulsory slick red lipstick and pulled out her cheap earrings. Maybe one day soon, she thought gleefully, she would be able to afford real diamonds.


	14. Chapter 14

**I tried to make this chapter a little lighter. No promises that this will continue though...  
Thanks for reading &amp; reviewing, I really appreciate it!**

The air in London was gorgeously cool, with a gentle drizzle falling. Zaf couldn't remember the last time when he had experienced an afternoon that wasn't swathed in uncomfortable warmth. It was about 3pm, and the sky had darkened to a sluggish grey, a tiny shard of sun shining through the thinner sections of cloud. Zaf and Lucas weaved through the crowds and the cars, dodging stray children and haphazardly-wheeled suitcases to meet Ros.

Ros was smoking a cigarette, leaning against the car. It didn't bother Zaf that she was smoking. He had smoked for a bit when he was about seventeen and so it didn't repulse him, but he'd never seen her smoke before. Then again, Zaf had been gone for years – it would be foolish to expect everything to be the same.

Zaf noticed Lucas also looking at Ros, almost as if he couldn't believe it was actually her. Zaf wondered why this must be, his eyes scanning over her. She was still kitted out in mostly black, with dark jeans and boots. Her hair was shorter than Zaf had remembered, smooth blonde strands brushing her neck.

When they reached the car Ros dropped her cigarette and ground her heel into it, turning her attention back to Lucas and Zaf. Zaf was hesitant. Should he say something funny? Or sincere? _'It's great to see you'_ sounded oddly formal and would probably provoke some sort of mocking reaction from Ros.

She looked at Zaf for a second before speaking: "Hello Zaf." Cool and casual.

"Hello Ros," Zaf returned, smirking.

"I'm afraid this car doesn't really compare with that convertible of yours." Ros gestured to the shoddy vehicle.

Zaf smiled. "My convertible? How is she?"

"_She's _fine," said Ros, raising an eyebrow at the way Zaf had personified his car, especially as he had opted for a female pronoun. "I drove _it_ to a carwash."

Zaf's initial reaction was one of worry: "No scratches?" he asked.

"None," Ros assured him. "Get in." Ros opened the door for him. Zaf hopped in gratefully.

That had been... fine. Ros wasn't one for awkwardness. And Zaf had found it sweet that she'd actually taken care of his car.

He watched through the window as Ros and Lucas shared a comment, nothing more. It seemed cold.

Lucas got in the back seat next to Zaf, leaving Ros isolated in the front. She smoothly started the car, gliding away from the busy cabs scattered around the airport.

"So," said Ros, spinning the steering wheel effortlessly, "I hear Istanbul's beautiful this time of year." Ros had spoken breezily and Zaf knew she was joking. He wondered whether he would feel hurt at someone making light of his capture, but he took it in good spirits. Besides, Zaf was a lot more comfortable with casual banter than serious conversations.

"Really? Well, I didn't exactly get the guided tour," he quipped.

"Maybe you should book a holiday there sometime," Ros suggested coolly.

"Y'know, for some reason, I'm not in a hurry to go back," Zaf replied with a smirk. He caught Ros' smile in the wing mirror. She was impressed. Zaf wondered who her partner in banter had been whilst he had been gone.

"Harry's been asking after you," she continued. "A couple months back we had a ruthless accountant in need of some dirty tricks. He felt your absence."

"You've either got the knack or you haven't," grinned Zaf, turning to tell Lucas the story of when he famously swapped a politician's order of washing powder to lobster. But Lucas was staring out of the window, watching raindrops chase each other across the cold glassy window. He returned to Ros.

"So what have you been up to then?" asked Zaf.

"Oh, the usual. Had two funerals."

"I never received my invites," said Zaf in mock-hurt.

"Must have got lost in the post," replied Ros.

Zaf's easy smile remained on his face until the car lurched down the familiar road and his eyes caught the splendour of the towering building. Zaf swallowed a lump in his throat. It had been great catching up with Ros, but he knew that from now on things got more serious. He'd have to have official interviews for the files, giving details on his capture and torture. Zaf shuddered at the thought of reliving those memories.

Ros parked the car efficiently. Lucas snapped off his seatbelt swiftly and jumped out, seemingly relieved that the journey was over.

Ros led the way, although Zaf remembered the route exactly. When they reached the building, they were halted by a couple of security guards, all of whom looked disapprovingly at Zaf. He ducked his head, realising how tattered and unworthy he must look compared to the smart suits of the other workers.

"Ros Myers, section D. Lucas North and Zafar Younis, also of section D," Ros introduced impatiently.

"May we see your identification passes please, gentlemen?" one guard asked.

"They've been undercover, of course they don't have ID," Ros scoffed, tapping a heel.

"I'm afraid I can't let you in without ID," the guard insisted.

"Look." Ros squared her shoulders. "I have been specifically instructed by Sir Harry Pearce to bring these two gentlemen back here immediately, particularly as Mr Younis has an urgent appointment at the medic centre, which you've probably already established on account of your gawking." Zaf raised an eyebrow in amusement at Ros' response, watching the guard lower his gaze from Zaf's dishevelled state back to Ros.

"Now, you wouldn't want to see Harry get angry, would you?" Ros continued. "I can tell you from first-hand experience that it's not a pretty sight."

The guard shifted, breaking eye contact from Ros' steely glare. Lucas also focused his eyes on the guard menacingly. Zaf looked up from under his eyelashes, shifting uncomfortably on his leg and readjusting his crutches.

"If you'd like to go on through," he said quietly.

"I'd have liked it more six minutes ago when I first asked," Ros said sweetly, marching ahead. Lucas exchanged a raise of eyebrows with Zaf and followed.

Zaf kept his gaze to the floor, ignoring the glances that he attracted at his injured state, walking across the floor he knew to the Grid. But he almost bumped into Lucas' back when Ros stopped suddenly; gesturing to two small rooms that Zaf had never noticed before.

"There's a change of clothes in there. You might be bugged." Zaf edged forward to one of the doors, but not before Lucas cut in: "Maybe it would have been wise to kill bugs before we entered the prestigious MI5 headquarters?"

"Maybe it would have been wise to not pick up any bugs in the first place," said Ros, a little smugly. The look Lucas gave her was one of pure loathing as he pulled his rucksack from one shoulder, barging into a room.

Ros must have noticed the worried look on Zaf's face as she added, "If you've got bugs, killing them in our territory will send a message. These people can't outwit our technology. You know that."

Zaf nodded, heading into the other room and shutting the door. There was a snug black t-shirt and a pair of jeans on the table, but other than that the room was bare.

His skin was healing now, but there were scars that would never fade completely. Zaf winced as he pulled on the new jeans, noticing how they were loose around his waist where he had lost a significant amount of weight.

Grabbing his crutches, Zaf shuffled back outside. Lucas was looking rather angry, wearing a salmon button-down shirt and some jeans that were a little too tight. Zaf's gaze passed subtly to Ros and knew that she had something to do with his incriminating change of clothes.

"This way," she said smoothly, her heels clicking against the marble floors.

Zaf stepped as confidently as he could into the pod on the right, savouring the slick sound it made as it spun round, leading them to the Grid.

Strangely, it was silent. Zaf moved forward on his crutches, searching for his desk, Adam's desk, Jo's desk. But each work station looked completely unfamiliar. There were no Top Gear magazines perched amongst paperwork on the desk where he used to sit. There was no photograph of Wes in Adam's territory. The chair behind Jo's station was missing her coat. He glanced over to the forgery suite, longing to see Malcolm plugging away at a new invention, but instead Zaf's eyes were met with only empty chairs.

"Zaf." The authoritative but friendly voice greeted him. Harry offered a nod to Ros and Lucas. "Would you all like to step into my office, please?"

Zaf meant to reply with a polite _'Of course'_ but his throat had dried up. He walked unsteadily, leaning on his crutches.

He hadn't been in Harry's office much – only to deliver a file or to poach the odd bit of stationary. It was pretty cosy, and Harry gestured for Zaf to sit on one of the chairs opposite his desk. Ros leant against the glass partition. Lucas folded his arms and stayed standing by the door.

"How was your flight?" Harry asked, sitting down behind his desk and resting his hands on some paperwork.

"Fine, thanks," said Zaf, trying to make eye contact.

"That's good," said Harry simply. Then he leaned forward. "As relieved as we are to have you back here, Zaf, I'm afraid the next few days will be somewhat... well, they won't be... ideal." Harry grappled for words that he didn't want to have to say. Zaf nodded. "I understand."

"Good," said Harry, nodding to himself. "We have accommodation here at Thames House – I've booked you a room. You'll have a visit from some doctors later to assess your health."

"Okay," said Zaf as steadily as he could, scraping as much of the office air as he could into his lungs.

"I'll get Ros to show you to your room now. Lucas, I'd like a word." Harry broke his eyes from Zaf's face, indicating the conversation was over. He rose, opening the solid sliding door of the office and smiling sincerely at his colleague as he passed.

"Good to have you back," commented Harry.

"Thank you," said Zaf, feeling suddenly overwhelmed. He dropped his head abashedly and hobbled out of the door, listening to Ros' heels connecting with the slick floor trotting ahead of him.


	15. Chapter 15

"**Home isn't where you live. It's where people understand you. If I don't have trust from MI5, from you, then I'll never really be home. I'll just be back in England." **

**Lucas said this to Harry after getting back from Russia in Series 7 and I wanted to explore it in this chapter.**

Stepping into the slick office with red walls and a sophisticated glass division, Lucas felt a sudden wave of nostalgia. He had sat in the chairs opposite the desk, paced the floors, sifted through the filing cabinets - when he was trusted. A valued team member. But now Lucas stood awkwardly by the door, feeling like an intruder, waiting for the moment that he could leave.

That moment wasn't to come soon enough, however, and this became apparent when Harry said 'Lucas, I'd like a word.' The request sounded polite but Lucas knew Harry well enough to know this wouldn't be a time to discuss the cricket.

Watching Zaf hobble away, led by Ros, Lucas finally sat down, placing his hands on his knees and trying to make eye contact with Harry, even though he was gripped with nervousness. His relationship with Harry had been good in the earlier years, and then it had broken down after Lucas had returned from Russia - he felt as if he now had to prove himself. Lucas thought that he could keep control of his feelings about being tortured and the Dakar bombing and John Bateman, but it all became too much for him - and he felt as if he'd got to the end of Harry's tether too. The easy trust and friendship they had once shared was now in tatters.

Ros had put Lucas on edge, from her smirks and glances and more prominently when she had hissed: "If you let him get hurt again you'll have hell to pay" before getting in the car. Lucas had no idea how close Ros and Zaf had been and had never experienced her showing a particular liking for a team member, although she had always said she preferred colleagues over families and friends. Also, the fact that Lucas had accepted her death made it surreal and uncomfortable that she had now casually returned to his life.

The silence was looming heavily, and Lucas shifted under his boss' stare. Finally, Harry spoke: "Thank you for getting Zaf back here."

Lucas was so relieved – he exhaled and started: "Thanks. Look, Harry-"

"And thank you for getting him stabbed," continued Harry, his voice dripping with sarcasm. "And thank you for picking up two bugs. I wouldn't have known that you were previously a senior operative judging by the train-wreck of this operation."

The words slammed into Lucas harder than punches. He knew it hadn't gone swimmingly, but Harry's words were deliberately cruel – and the word _previously_ had a particular sting. This man used to be like a father to him.

Lucas wanted to defend himself or apologise, but instead he asked: "Two bugs?"

"There was another one on your coat," said Harry. His voice expressed no emotion.

Lucas paused. "Harry, I'm-"

"_You're _what?" Harry asked quietly, venomously. "Sorry? Is that it?" He was working himself into a bubbling anger. "Sorry that your colleague who was tortured for years hardly made it back to his country alive whereas you picked up bugs, left him alone in the house-"

"The house which you directed us to," countered Lucas, fed up with Harry's list of his failures. Lucas knew he had made too many mistakes and would probably never see the Grid again. He had nothing to lose now – he might as well speak his mind.

"Yeah, kind of ironic that Zaf got stabbed in a _safe_ house. One that _you_ said was ideal, when it was barely stocked. Now either you've got no idea who you're dealing with, or you've got a mole. Someone with the details of the safe houses that MI5 use told you that it would be okay for us, and also told these torturers or terrorists or whatever they are to meet us there."

Lucas expected Harry to scream at him for this, but he was silent, rubbing a hand across his forehead. "You're right," he said.

Lucas almost spluttered in disbelief. "Sorry?"

"Only someone within MI5 could have known about the safe house. I'm sorry."

Lucas leant back in his chair in disbelief that Harry had apologised. The atmosphere was quiet now.

"I had to leave him," said Lucas softly. Harry looked up.

"In the safe house," Lucas continued. "He wasn't well enough to walk, and I thought both of us leaving would look suspicious. There wasn't any signal to call in a status report-"

"I know," said Harry. "You did the right thing."

Lucas couldn't believe what he was hearing. "Look, Harry, you don't have to defend me. I know I screwed everything up," he confessed.

"You got Zaf here alive. That's what's important. I shouldn't have snapped at you. You've come far, Lucas. After the rooftop... _incident_, I thought I'd never see you again. I have to admit I'm quite glad that that hasn't been the case." Harry rose from his desk. "Drink?"

Lucas nodded, watching in silence as Harry poured out two glasses of whiskey, handing one to Lucas and returning to his black swivel chair.

"It's not fair, is it?" said Lucas softly, after taking a sip. Harry cocked an eyebrow. Lucas laughed a little. "I got years of torture, but it was my fault for making a mess of my life. Zaf got years of torture, and he didn't deserve it at all."

Harry nodded slowly. "It's not a case of deserving. It's what you do afterwards that counts. Whether you let it ruin you or... move on."

Lucas nodded at Harry's philosophical reply, taking another sip from the glass in his hand. When Lucas had been a new recruit Harry had invited him into his office for a whiskey every week, asking about how he was getting on. Back then, Lucas would use hair gel and shave every morning and wear crisp suits. He found it almost laughable now. Lucas scrubbed a hand across the stubble on his jaw and downed the rest of the whiskey.

"I should be off," he said efficiently, even though he didn't know what he would do with the remaining hours of the day, or the series of days after that. The thought of countless empty weeks ahead of him was suffocating.

"I assume you'll help me find the mole, at least for Zaf's sake?" Harry mused aloud.

Lucas didn't even hesitate in agreeing. "Have you got any more intel on the group that had Zaf?"

Harry frowned. "It's all a bit... vague. I sent an agent this morning to take up surveillance of the building."

"Surveillance? Is that it?" Lucas asked incredulously.

"It's only a starting point. Once we've established their modus operandi, we'll be able to tackle them more effectively."

"Their modus operandi is torturing whoever they're given for as much money as they can get," said Lucas bitterly.

"That may be so, but if we act too quickly they'll disappear underground," replied Harry.

Lucas knew that Harry was right, of course, and after all Zaf had been through Lucas knew they had to act carefully.

"See you in the morning," said Lucas, getting to his feet. He made it sound almost like a question, as if he was unsure as to what Harry's response would be. Harry nodded, simply, reassuringly. But just before Lucas left, he asked Harry a simple question.

"Do you remember what I said to you about being home when I got back from Russia?"

Harry took a few seconds to think before answering. "You said home is where people understand you." And then he added. "Welcome home, Lucas."


	16. Chapter 16

Zaf didn't like first days.

He always tried to make himself look the part by dressing well, smelling good and making his hair look great. But this particular morning when the alarm greeted him, he switched it off and spent the time he would have spent getting ready daydreaming, still half asleep.

Today he would find out which of his friends were still alive.

It was cruel, really, how transient a career in the service could be. Harry had been there for a while but other than him, Zaf had never seen someone stick it out. Even Ruth who was ridiculously intelligent and had years of GCHQ experience under her belt had been forced to flee in the end. It was a game of chance – win or lose, live or die.

The sound of the door being pounded on woke Zaf fully. He clambered out of the mountain of duvets he had been entangled in and twisted the door handle, met by a very efficient and slightly-pissed-off looking Ros.

"You didn't forget, did you?" she asked.

"No, I just overslept," Zaf lied.

"I'll come back in ten." Her eyes scanned Zaf's sleepy, disorganised state and she smirked a little at his bed head. "Maybe fifteen."

Zaf shut the door, pulling his fingers through his hair. It was longer than he usually wore it, brushing the back of his neck untidily. He considered searching for some hair gel but figured he would need more that fifteen minutes to sort the hair, let alone get washed and dressed too. Besides, good hair wouldn't really take away the focus from the countless scars tattooed across his body.

Zaf splashed cool water into his face and brushed his teeth tentatively, avoiding the broken sections of gum where several of his teeth had been pulled out. He studied himself in the mirror, not in a vain way – rather, he was just taking a moment to see what he looked like.

It wasn't good. His skin was brighter and cleaner but badly scarred – there were scratches along his jaw and bruises on his cheeks, with a dark line zigzagging across one eyebrow. His ears had been burnt and torn, his neck a marbled shade of blue and red. The only part he recognised of himself was his eyes, the unmistakable soft brown shade, but even they lacked the cheeky glint they once held. Zaf vowed that he would get this back, in time.

He began to raid the wardrobe in his temporary accommodation. It was odd to think that just a few floors above were the illustrious Section D headquarters, whereas the lower floors of the building held normal hotel-like rooms. There was a bed and bathroom, with a sofa opposite a small telly and a tiny kitchen (Zaf had already raided the mini fridge – the results were disappointing). It was nondescript but pretty cosy, and besides, Zaf didn't have anywhere else to go.

He'd shared a flat with Jo, and after he'd gone... did she sell it? Move in with someone else? The idea of someone else getting to see Jo put on her make-up and eat her breakfast made Zaf feel strangely envious.

Zaf pictured her on the Grid now, writing report details in her looped handwriting, tapping the keyboard, munching a pasta salad on her break. But then his mind saw her fade out, replaced by someone else sitting at her desk, working, typing, a faceless figure that wasn't her...

The knocking was more insistent the second time. "Leave your hair alone Zaf!" Ros shouted.

Zaf rubbed his eyes. He had sat down on the sofa to tie his shoelaces but his mind had drifted off. He decided to shut off the doubtful side of his mind and stick to his promise of not thinking about who would be on the Grid until he saw for himself.

"Sorry Ros," he smiled, giving his hair an extra ruffle to irk her and shutting the door of the room.

"Harry thought you'd want to re-familiarise yourself – today isn't about you being thrown in the deep end." Ros' voice was efficient but Zaf knew she would have noticed the slight trembling of his hand as he had reached for the lift button.

"Yeah, I know," said Zaf, although he didn't really know what he would actually be doing. Making tea? Handing out files? It would feel completely and horribly different from the team role he once had.

Ros' footsteps were fast but Zaf managed to keep up as they reached the pods. Zaf stood a little straighter and attempted a smile. He loved the pods. Didn't know why. They were just a nice sophisticated twist to an office rather than a door where you have to decide whether it's push or pull and inevitably get it wrong and get scornful stares from onlookers.

Zaf's mind was pulled from musing when Ros' voice cut through the Grid. "Everyone, Zaf. Zaf, everyone."

Zaf shifted, feeling very much like the new kid at school who started halfway through a term. And why would Ros be introducing him to people he knew?

As a tall, muscled guy and slim brunette woman came to say hello, the truth slammed into him.

He didn't know _any_ of these people.

"Hi. I'm Dimitri." The man held out a hand for a shake. Zaf risked letting go of a crutch to return the handshake.

"Zaf. Nice to meet you," he said, sounding formal. Zaf _despised_ formal.

"Zaf, hi. I'm Erin Watts," introduced the brunette.

"Nice to meet you," Zaf said again, sounding mechanical. He felt as if he was intruding. This girl was pretty but Zaf's head was too overwhelmed to process a flirty remark. He glanced over at Ros who had headed to her desk, leaving Zaf awkwardly stranded at the front.

"Is Malcolm here?" he asked Erin quietly.

"Yeah, he's in the forgery suite," replied Erin, her voice smooth and toneless.

With every laboured step Zaf took, the crutches clicking, Zaf felt more and more as if he didn't belong. Dimitri and Erin had seemed nice but they were young and he could tell what they were like by their bright eyes and expectant faces. Zaf had felt that way before – infinite. They were squeaky-clean, A-grade students and Zaf felt a stab of cynicism.

"Zaf?" said the familiar voice.

"Hey, Malcolm," said Zaf, a genuine smile warming his features.

"It's so good to see you!" Malcolm put down the bug he had been working on.

"And you," said Zaf, glancing over at the project Malcolm had abandoned. "What's that?"

Malcolm's face twisted uncomfortably. "I don't know if I'm supposed to say," he admitted, sounding ashamed.

"Why not?" Zaf asked, a little hurt.

"Well..." Malcolm was struggling for words. "I didn't know whether you were still... on the team."

"Why else would I be here?" questioned Zaf, unable to conceal the offence in his voice.

"Zaf." A leather-gloved hand clapped his shoulder.

"Lucas," Zaf returned, only just meeting his eyes.

"Do you want to go down to the archives?"

"Might as well find out now," said Zaf, attempting to sound brave, but he could feel a tightening sickness gripping his stomach. He hobbled out of the suite, feeling the eyes of everyone as they watched him leave.

Zaf had always found the archives boring. He wasn't much of a linguist or an analyst and so wasn't here often, although he would bring Ruth a cup of coffee if she were working down here on a paperwork day. It was quite small but everything had its place. Zaf hobbled to the filing cabinet that read 'Officers' and flicked through the alphabet.

C. Carter. Zaf was used to seeing Fiona's name in here, but now she had been joined by her husband.

Before he had a chance to think too much, Zaf pulled out the file and placed it on the table, sitting down on the cold metal chair that accompanied it. He flicked open the first page.

A car bomb had been left at a Remembrance Sunday ceremony in 2008. Adam had driven it to an unpopulated zone and was the only person killed in the blast.

Zaf read the words several times before he was able to fully process them. He was so used to reading reports like this, but it always happened to someone else. Not his best friend.

The only thing he could think to be thankful for was that his death was probably instantaneous. And he had saved so many others whilst sacrificing himself. Zaf tried to use this to comfort himself, but it didn't work. It didn't get rid of the fact that he was gone.

A cold numbness had settled into him. He thought he might as well finish what he had started. Zaf rose, flicking through the files robotically until he reached P for Portman.

Joanna Megan Portman. Born 1979, died 2009. Just thirty years old.

Shot in a terrorist hostage situation to prevent the detonation of a bomb that would have taken out the entire room full of people.

Zaf looked away before reading the rest. The tears muddling his eyes had already broken free as he read the sentence again.

_The shot which killed both the terrorist and Joanna Portman was fired by Rosalind Myers._


	17. Chapter 17

**Bit of a shorter chapter where the team are just trying to establish who they're up against. I will try to make the next chapter more interesting!**

3.207042501

Lucas' fingers raced across the keyboard as he typed Zaf's numbers into the MI5 search database. They could be a map reference, or a formula, or lottery numbers for all Lucas knew - but he was sure that it would give them their first proper lead on Zaf's capture.

He had personally told the team before Zaf and Ros arrived to be cool, to give Zaf space. Lucas even told Malcolm to not worry Zaf with the bug he was trying to dismantle which Lucas picked up on his coat. Lucas wondered if he'd gone a step too far – he didn't want Zaf to worry or be overwhelmed on his first day back, neither feel as if he didn't belong. Lucas cursed inwardly when he realised he hadn't quite got the balance right as he watched Zaf shuffle back from the archives and head to Harry's office in obvious distress.

Lucas snapped his attention back to the screen. He was disappointed to see that there was no link to the numbers on any of Five's databases. Lucas narrowed his eyes and tried Six's mainframe, which he had gained access to cautiously with Malcolm's assistance. His fingers typed more carefully this time, conscious that any mistake made would cause an alarm to be tripped and result in a visit from a techie complaining about the fragility of inter-service relations.

Again, the search threw up nothing.

Lucas moved his eyes from the computer screen to Ros. He knew she was finding it difficult to approach Zaf. She was the only team member other than Harry from the 'old days' and was obviously relieved that Zaf was back, but Lucas got the feeling that Ros had only ever seen his charming, jokey side. Perhaps she felt unsure of how to help him - if he even needed or wanted her help, that is.

Of course, this was all speculation. Ros' face remained as unfazed as ever.

"Lucas." Malcolm hardly ever set foot out of the forgery suite and so Lucas was surprised to see him approaching his desk.

"I've managed to do some checks on this bug and it's a rather sophisticated piece of kit - whoever's doing this has good funding. But something worries me."

"What, Malcolm?"

"This bug is one of our own. Fairly recent batch, and as far as I know no-one outside of Thames House has got their paws on it yet."

Lucas ran a hand across his forehead – the mole had been at work.

"Any fingerprints?"

"Yes, only one set – a Miss Ayla Akbulut. She's an air hostess from Istanbul-"

"Thanks Malcolm. Can you send me her file please?"

"Certainly."

The air hostess had planted the bug?

Lucas wondered what Ayla had to do with this, whatever_ this_ was.

If her fingerprints were on file, it was likely that she was on a watch list for some sort of wrongdoing – but skimming her profile, she seemed clean. The reason MI5 knew of her was because of her husband, Fahir Akbulut, who attempted to plant a bomb years ago somewhere in London. When the explosion was prevented by the security services, he had disappeared underground, leaving nothing but a voice sample of a very poor quality. Presumably, he returned to Istanbul and later married Ayla. Whatever he was doing over there, it had been kept rather secretive.

_Why would the wife of a potential terrorist bug an MI5 officer? _Lucas thought, running through possible reasons in his head. _Personal revenge_ (unlikely, seeing as he had never heard of either of them). _Money_ (if the hope was that Lucas was going to fork out, they were sorely mistaken – his salary was laughable). _Higher orders that she wasn't supposed to question_ seemed like a plausible solution.

Lucas glanced up towards Harry's office, and was surprised to see him clasping the phone but looking directly through the glass at Lucas.

"It's for you," Harry mouthed, stabbing a button and replacing the handset. Lucas picked up the phone on his desk.

"Lucas North, who is this?"

"Steven Bennett. Do you know who that is?"

"Who's speaking?" Lucas asked.

"I said, do you know who Steven Bennett is?"

"No," replied Lucas honestly.

"Well, you're about to. This is message one of four. Have fun, Lucas." The voice sounded mocking when it spoke his name, almost as if he knew it to be false. The beep sounded, telling that the stranger had ended the call.

Lucas rose and paced to Harry's door, tugging it open without knocking and waiting for permission to enter.

"Who is Steven Bennett?" Lucas asked the two men. Harry's face was blank, but Zaf's features moved in recognition of the name.

"I knew a guy called Steven Bennett when I worked on the North African desk," Zaf explained.

"And?" Lucas prompted.

Zaf buried his face in his hands briefly before speaking. "And I saw him get shot dead in the prison courtyard."

"The undercover agent who informed us of your whereabouts?" questioned Lucas.

"I didn't know that he knew I was there. And I didn't really get to study his face but he looked familiar, but at the time I couldn't remember where I recognised him from or if I was just kidding myself-" Zaf was babbling.

Harry took control: "Why don't you two visit his last known address and see if you can find anything? It seems your new friend is rather keen for you to do so. I'll get Malcolm to analyse the message to try and match a face to the voice and establish a location of where the call was made."

"Up for it?" Lucas asked. Zaf reached for his crutches and got to his feet.


	18. Chapter 18

The apartment was spacious and airy, receiving a generous wedge of late morning sun through the windows. A few sofas were clustered in front of a coffee table littered with coffee mugs. A handful of tulips were wilting in a coloured vase on the breakfast bar, which was silver and spotless. A coat and stripy scarf hung on the peg by the door. The whole place looked so homely and lived-in that Zaf was half expecting someone to return any minute.

He felt horribly intrusive sifting through a dead colleague's possessions. Zaf flicked on the answer phone machine: "Steven, I've booked the restaurant for 7 o'clock next Saturday. Hope your work conference goes well. Can't wait to celebrate our anniversary!" Zaf winced at the jovial tone of the recent widow.

"What are we looking for?" he asked, glancing up at Lucas who was tapping away at the computer.

"Anything that might link Steven Bennett to my mystery caller," Lucas replied, squinting at the screen.

There was a picture of his wife on the coffee table, and some plane tickets to Paris for this weekend, which was presumably an anniversary present. Zaf picked them up and noticed an odd detail.

"Lucas," said Zaf, reaching for his crutches which he had propped up against the breakfast bar, but Lucas came to him. "What have you found?"

"These plane tickets weren't bought by Steven," Zaf said, holding them out to his friend. Lucas studied the tickets and decided to take them to Malcolm for a search of the credit card used to purchase them.

The pair had searched every drawer, cupboard and corner of the apartment and found nothing to link Steven Bennett to Istanbul or the caller.

"When we get back to the Grid, we'll pull up his file and find the mission details of why he was placed there," Lucas decided. "Ready to go?"

"Yeah," said Zaf hesitantly, letting his eyes move over the apartment again. The man who once lived here was killed by trying to save him – it was a debt Zaf could now never repay.

"Zaf?" said Lucas quietly. Zaf snapped his eyes up to his colleague's face.

"Let's go," Zaf agreed, heading out of the apartment as quickly as he was able, awkwardly manoeuvring the crutches to leave the dead man's house in peace.

...

"Have you found anything?"

Lucas was leaning over Zaf's desk. Zaf had finally felt like he had a place on the Grid again after being reunited with the desk he had originally occupied. He had found his previous possessions in storage and replaced them to their rightful positions – a bag of jelly beans nestled in the desk drawer, several Top Gear magazines hidden under paperwork, and a wad of blue post-it notes perched on the corner.

"Not a lot. Six have been notoriously vague with the report details. Seems he may have just been doing surveillance," replied Zaf, although this knowledge had made him feel worse. Steven had been on a low-level op and ended up dead – because of him.

"I'll see if Malcolm's got anything from the plane tickets," said Lucas, striding away.

Zaf scrawled a couple of details from Steven's file on a post-it note, although his attention was drifting. Ever since arriving back, he was acutely aware of how different he felt being in the Grid. It wasn't the same when Lucas called out if he wanted a cup of coffee when it had always been Ruth that had offered. When Dimitri suggested going to the pub after work, Zaf's agreement wasn't as eager as if would be if it were Adam asking. When Erin handed him a file and their fingers brushed, Zaf didn't get the same tingle that Jo's touch would provide – he felt cold skin and a horrible sadness ripping his insides. Her smile was of little comfort, and yet Jo's could brighten the most boring of office days.

Zaf glanced up at Ros, who was coolly writing up a status report, her back arching over her desk as she wrote. Zaf had avoided her since finding out that she had been the one that ended Jo's life. Did the memory haunt her? Or did she carry it out with chilling efficiency, not batting an eyelid as it was for the greater good? Either way, the thought of associating with Ros again made Zaf feel extremely uncomfortable.

So he wasn't overwhelmed with the news that the two plane tickets hadn't been an anniversary surprise for Steven to give to his wife – rather, they were from the mystery caller. It seemed that the second message would be waiting in Paris.

_What was the purpose of the first message? _Zaf pondered. If it had been to make him feel guilty about Steven's death, it had certainly worked.

Zaf had read the email the caller had provided with the account details of the purchase, but it had specified that Lucas was not to go – instead, Zaf and another colleague were to collect the second message and bring it back to London.

Zaf shifted in his seat, willing the inevitable not to happen.

Ros volunteered.


	19. Chapter 19

"Have you ever been to Paris?"

Ros' question was typically conversational which wasn't really her style, so Zaf was sceptical to give her a reply.

"No," he said finally, shortly. "You?"

"A few times," she said coolly. "All a bit too culturally-obsessed and romantic for my tastes."

"Why did you bother going then?" he asked, a tad cynically.

"Work," was her reply. Zaf was already finding this awkward and they hadn't even reached the airport yet. Ros' hands were tapping the steering wheel impatiently as the traffic jam shifted slightly. Zaf sipped the Diet Coke in his hands and glanced out of the window.

"How is life off crutches?" asked Ros. After his recent physical assessment Zaf was thrilled to hear that his left leg was now strong enough for him to walk without the crutches, albeit with a small limp where his foot was still tender. The burns and bruises were less prominent but Zaf was advised to not walk long distances as to not put pressure on it.

"Good," said Zaf simply.

Ros inhaled sharply, a tell-tale sign of trouble with her. "Why are you moping, Zaf?"

The scorn in her voice made something inside of Zaf snap. "Oh, I dunno. I've been tortured for a couple years, and caused the death of a colleague because of it, and all my previous friends and colleagues are dead. You're right, I've got no reason whatsoever to be upset." His voice gave away what he was feeling more than he had intended, but the frown growing on Ros' face prompted him to add: "Also, you killed Jo. _You killed her_. How am I supposed to feel towards you now?"

The car carried a heavy silence for a few intolerable seconds before Ros spoke. "I just meant that you weren't the moping type."

"Well, people change. I've heard a couple of years rotting by yourself in a cell waiting for help that never comes can do that to you." Zaf's throat was sore and his eyes were stinging with tears. He kept his gaze focussed on his lap.

"I wasn't getting at you, Zaf," she said calmly.

"That seems to be your speciality," he commented quietly.

Ros sighed. "Do you honestly think I'd offer to go to Paris for the weekend with you if I couldn't stand you? We're colleagues, Zaf. I might even consider referring to you as a friend, so I'm not trying to get at you; I'm just not going to shy away from what's happened to you like the rest of our oh-so-sensitive colleagues because I don't do sensitivity, especially in our line of work. If you'd rather sit silently I won't protest, but likewise if you want me to tell you about Jo's death it's your right to know."

Zaf blinked a couple of times. "I don't know if I want to know."

"Well, you'll have plenty of time to figure it out in this ridiculously long traffic jam in which we are currently a part of," replied Ros, glaring at the car in front.

Zaf opted for silence for a while to gather his thoughts. He was glad that Ros wasn't tiptoeing around the topic of his capture and torture, using euphemisms and nodding her head and murmuring thoughtfully as he spilled his feelings. But a part of him knew it wouldn't hurt for someone to show a little sympathy – although, Zaf didn't feel comfortable with draining people's contentedness with his own troubles.

"Hallelujah," Ros muttered under her breath as the traffic started slogging forward gradually. Zaf glanced down at the can of Coke between his hands, now warmer than optimum drinking temperature. He took a sip and quickly placed the can back between his legs.

"How long is it until we get to the airport?" Zaf asked.

"About an hour if the traffic keeps moving," replied Ros. Her gaze flitted to him for a second. "You look better."

Zaf nearly choked on the second sip of Coke that he had precariously opted for. "When was your last eye test courtesy of the Service, Ros?" His tone was derisive, but he was secretly relieved that the signs of his trauma were beginning to fade.

"You're walking taller. You always used to do that to appear more dominant when any female was around," Ros commented amusedly. Zaf felt a small blush brush his cheeks. "What, did you think I didn't notice you studying yourself in your computer monitor?" she added.

"Nothing wrong with being conscious of your appearance," replied Zaf, timely checking his hair in the wing mirror.

"I mean it, though. Your scars are fading. Won't get as many women swooning after the attractive, injured spy anymore," she informed him.

Zaf raised an eyebrow. "Attractive?"

It was Ros' turn to blush. "I was trying to be nice, Zaf. Don't get cocky."

Zaf wiggled his eyebrows, a trait that had made Ros roll her eyes over the years, and today she didn't disappoint.

Mercifully, the flight wasn't delayed, and the journey itself was short. A couple of hours later Ros was smiling at a hotel receptionist and collecting the keys for two separate rooms, leading the way to the lift and selecting the button for floor 10.

"Nice place," Zaf commented as their feet scraped the maroon carpet of the corridor.

"Our caller spared no expenses," remarked Ros as she handed Zaf his room key. "These rooms are the best in the hotel."

Zaf accepted the key gratefully and unlocked the heavy door of his room, which was just opposite Ros'. He was feeling the regrets about coming to Paris with Ros fade rapidly as he explored his hotel room.

The bed looked big enough to fit four people and had a luxurious mattress with thick duvets and a scarlet throw tucked around the foot. The headboard was made of carved mahogany and sleek curtains draped from all sides. An abundance of plush gold and cream cushions were propped up against the fluffy pillows. The floor was the same deep red carpet of the corridors but was equipped with a soft rug sprawled next to the bed. A sleek television was displayed on one of the golden-cream walls, in between two majestic oil paintings. The lighting was soft and made the walls shimmer, and drawing back the warm curtains, Zaf revealed a view of the Eiffel Tower rising up in the distance.

Zaf knelt down by the mini fridge and popped the cork from the tiny bottle of champagne, distracted by his mobile bleating in his pocket.

"Doctor said no alcohol," said Ros sternly.

"How did you-"

"Know? After raiding your desk on several occasions I concluded that your life revolves around spying, cars and women, but also a _tendency_ to drink alcohol and eat ridiculous quantities of food."

"Intuitive," Zaf remarked, a smile warming his face.

"The latter is one preference that I suggest we indulge in – I'm starving. Fancy a date to your first French cafe?"

"Actually, there used to be a Paul's at St Pancras-"

"A real French cafe, Zaf. French menus."  
"My French is a little flaky, and by that I mean non-existent," confessed Zaf.

"Well, my father may be a traitor to his country, but he did teach me French. I'll do the ordering."

"Will there be cake?" Zaf asked hopefully.

"Yes, Zaf, there'll be cake," Ros reassured, hanging up, but Zaf had heard the smile in her voice.

Zaf slipped the champagne back into the fridge and placed his suitcase in the plush armchair tucked under the desk, pulling his coat back on. He heard his phone ring again.

"I thought hard to get would be your speciality, Ros," joked Zaf.

"Remember what you're here for. Enjoy Paris. Enjoy the hotel. But tomorrow you have to find the message."

"Who is this?" Zaf asked, his voice cold.

"Don't worry yourself, Zaf. Get the message and come home."

"Why?" asked Zaf nervously.

"Let's just say that things will get... difficult for you again, otherwise." The shrill tone told that the caller had hung up.

The thought of cake and smiling and finally feeling okay disappeared from Zaf's mind as he sat on the bed, feeling very alone in the glamorous hotel room that he didn't deserve.


	20. Chapter 20

**A/N: Apologies for a chapter lacking plot development - I wanted to go straight onto what happens next in Paris but thought it would be logical to see what the characters are making of the mystery caller so far. If you would like to review, it'd be very much appreciated! **

The Grid

"How's it going?"

Lucas' tone was light and his words casual, which were both unlike him. Admittedly, it was a phrase he had heard Adam use in the brief time that they had spent together and Lucas had quite liked it. It wasn't too fake-friendly, neither was it horribly formal. Lucas opted to direct it at Dimitri on this particular occasion.  
"Not very well," Dimitri replied, a frown etching his face. "I went down to Hyde Park where the first call was made to see if anyone had seen someone unusual, but no-one said a word. He also impressively managed to dodge the CCTV covering all entrances and exits to the park. I assume we're dealing with a professional."

"He?" Lucas questioned.

"The voice was male," said Dimitri. "Could he have used a voice alteration programme?"

"Hmm." Lucas tapped a biro against his lips. "If he's sophisticated enough that we didn't get a trace of him on CCTV he _or she_ may well have access to top quality equipment."

Lucas emphasised the _she_ because he still felt Ayla could be playing a part in this. It couldn't be a coincidence that she bugged Lucas' jacket and the next day he started receiving anonymous calls directing him to messages – but how would she be involved?

"What do you think they meant, messages? Just phone calls?"

"I think there's more to it than that," said Lucas. "Otherwise, why else send us to a dead man's flat to get plane tickets? I think that in each call, they're telling us something."

"Like what?" Dimitri asked.

"I don't know... yet," said Lucas. In the pause as each man pondered, Lucas studied Dimitri. He had worked closely with him before the whole John Bateman fiasco resurfaced, and wondered if the other man held feelings of contempt for his betrayal, or if he understood him. Whatever his feelings about Lucas, however, Dimitri was completely professional and civil towards him.

"How well did Zaf know Steven Bennett?" asked Dimitri.

"Don't know – why?"

"Well, he'd be feeling guilty about his death. Could that be a message of some sort?"

"I really don't know what Zaf's feeling right now, but it's a start." Lucas ran a hand through his hair. "Anything on where the call was made in Paris?"

"Malcolm's still working on it," said Dimitri, watching his friend pace to the forgery suite for an update.

Paris

"Are you okay?"

"The cake's good."

"No, that's not what I-"

"I'm fine. Try some of this cake." Zaf used a teaspoon to deliver a dollop of the chocolate and caramel cake to Ros' plate.

"I'll eat it when you tell me what's bothering you," Ros tried to compromise gently.

"The caller," said Zaf simply, taking a sip of his hot chocolate before speaking again. "What does he want?"

"I don't know," said Ros, wrapping her fingers around her coffee mug and watching Zaf. He seemed to be relaxing a little despite the circumstances, which was no wonder as the setting they were now in was picturesque and peaceful. They were at a small table perched on a typically Parisian street with a gentle wave of sun brushing the tiny paving slabs and a couple of pigeons scrabbling for crumbs as company.

"Do you think it's personal? Or is he getting at MI5?"

"I don't know," Ros repeated, picking up the chunk of cake that Zaf had given her. "But whoever it is, they've planned it well."

"What are the messages supposed to do?"  
Ros was none the wiser on the bizarre happenings but thought logically in an attempt to console Zaf. "Well, how did you feel after hearing Steven Bennett's name?"

Zaf shrugged. "Guilty." He plucked a marshmallow that had been bobbing on the surface of his hot chocolate and chewed thoughtfully. "Whoever's doing this must know about my capture. Steven was caught and killed by the people that held me."

"Who else would know about your capture other than MI5, or the capturers themselves?" asked Ros, smoothly avoiding the topic of Yalta who also had intel about his abduction.

"Lucas and Harry think we've got a mole," offered Zaf.

At the word 'mole', Ros tried desperately to conceal any flicker of emotion from her face, but Zaf had switched his attention back to his hot chocolate so she doubted he would have noticed anyway. Should she bother telling him about Yalta? How she started a trip of deceit and betrayal, convincing herself it was to find him but ending up in a web of lies that nearly got her and Harry killed? She didn't want Zaf to become suspicious of her – plus, she wouldn't make the same mistake twice of being a traitor. Ros wondered who the mole would be this time and what had made them turn.

She watched Zaf sip his hot chocolate, froth gathered around his mouth when he took the mug away, and Ros thought that in that second he looked too young and innocent and content for it to be worth her causing him any more pain.

"Refreshed enough to find the next message tomorrow?" she questioned, finishing the last sip of her coffee and reaching for her purse.

"Maybe I could get a cake to take away too?" asked Zaf, wiping his mouth on a napkin. At Ros' raised eyebrows he spoke again: "I'm malnourished, Ros, so I think it's a reasonable request. That last slice of passion fruit gateau has my name on it."

His response was sincere but sounded so sweet that Ros nodded, feeling a little like a mother telling her child they could go and get a 99 from the ice-cream van. She realised this was the only feeling of true responsibility and care that she would have. This realisation gnawed at her until she felt a coldness settling into her thoughts, but as long as she kept Zaf safe this time, Ros thought she might just leave behind the bitter taste of her betrayal, a least for a little while.


	21. Chapter 21

**A/N: Sorry I haven't uploaded for a while; I'm afraid new chapters are unlikely to be frequent over the next couple of weeks. I have been to these places in Paris but not for a while, so apologies if any of the details are incorrect. Thanks for reading/reviewing!**

Zaf was woken up by a text at 9am on the dot: _'Rise and shine! Time to find the message. Your pretty blonde will suffer if you refuse. Pont de l'Archevêché, midday. Don't be late._

Zaf winced at the 'your pretty blonde' in reference to Ros and had no idea where this place was, but knew that she would. He knocked on the door of Ros' hotel room lightly and was surprised when she appeared almost instantly, wearing fresh clothes and heels and lipstick.

Zaf wordlessly held up his phone to show her the text and winced at the fact she was fully dressed and ready to go, whereas he had lumbered over in the same clothes he had been wearing as yesterday, too tired to change last night and falling asleep on top of the bed, the covers beneath him.

"Pont de l'Archevêché isn't far from here," commented Ros.

"What is it?"

"'Archbishops' Bridge. Crosses the Seine River," replied Ros. "Covered in love locks."

"Should I ask?" said Zaf, one eyebrow raised.

"Couple engrave their names onto a padlock and attach it to a bridge or gate and throw the key away to symbolise their everlasting commitment to one another. It's as every bit as nauseating as it sounds."

"Not the romantic, eh Ros?" Zaf commented with a smirk. "How far from here to this love-bridge?"

"No more than half an hour on foot. I'll send in the status report; you shower and put on new clothes," Ros said efficiently, scanning Zaf disapprovingly. "Tu es dégoûtant, Zafar."

"I beg your pardon?"

"Oh, I'm going to enjoy this," Ros said sweetly. "Meet you down at breakfast in twenty minutes." She shut the door of her room, leaving Zaf stranded in the corridor.

11:00

"What exactly are we looking for?" asked Zaf as he and Ros walked the warm morning streets. She had said the journey wouldn't take more than half an hour but they had left with plenty of time, just to be safe.

"No idea. Malcolm's looking out for anything unusual."

Zaf heard Ros mutter _'La Conciergerie' _as they strolled past a massive, noble-looking building, and then _'Pont Notre-Dame'_ as they passed a bridge to their left. It seemed that she knew exactly where she was going without Malcolm's assistance on comms. Zaf on the other hand was struggling to pinpoint where they were - despite studying Geography at uni (and getting a 2:1) the course didn't exactly detail the differences between all the confusing cobbled streets and identical-looking bridges that Paris provided. He wasn't really one for culture but was enjoying watching everyday life blur around him.

The day was hot, and so when Ros suggested stopping for an iced coffee Zaf didn't complain.

"Okay, Pont de l'Archevêché is just across there." Ros clasped her coffee in one hand and pointed with the other.

Zaf nodded. He felt a little more in familiar territory now as Notre-Dame Cathedral was just behind them.

"Malcolm, we're nearly here," said Ros as they walked along the Seine. Just in the distance, Zaf caught a twinkling glare reflected by the sun – upon closer inspection; it was the thousands upon thousands of padlocks hugging the bridge.

"Five to twelve," Ros said to herself as they stepped onto the bridge.

"Okay, I've got something," Malcolm said into the comms. The pair slowed down a little, but unnoticeably, still blending with the crowds walking the bridge. "About two-thirds of the way down, there's a man sitting on the edge of the bridge."

"Can you face-match him?" Ros asked, walking solidly closer and closer.

"It'll take a moment."

The crowds seemed uninterested in the man perched on the bridge, dangling his legs. They didn't notice how he kept checking his watch and staring at his feet, chunky boots that looked too big for him, watching them sway back and forth tauntingly above the water.

"Lovely day, isn't it?" Ros said conversationally to the man, leaning on the bridge to his left. Zaf watched as she removed her sunglasses casually and looked across the river.

"What do you want?" the man asked. His words would have sounded harsh if his voice wasn't trembling slightly.

"I don't want anything, I was just saying," said Ros breezily. "Have you been to _Le Tournebievre_? I might head there with my friend for lunch."Behind her back, she gestured with her hand for Zaf to come forward. He did so hesitantly, standing beside Ros.

"I'm new to all this Parisian stuff. But she assures me that the food there is great," Zaf offered smoothly.

"What are you doing?" he asked, a little louder, scared.

"We're not doing anything," said Zaf gently, easing a little closer. "What's your name?"

"Matthew Denham," he said, and Zaf noticed Ros' face move slightly in recognition of the name.

"Didn't you used to work in Section C?" she asked.

"_Used to_ being the key words," he said, and then laughed once, drily. "Twenty years ago, Ros."

If Ros was surprised that he knew her name she didn't show it. "Why did you leave the Service?"

"I watched too many good people die," he said roughly, shifting slightly. Zaf caught Ros' eye and knew she was aware of how close he was to the edge of the bridge and the fall below.

"You know that the service saves more lives than it takes," she said softly. For the first time, he turned to look at her.

"And for what? So the media can claim we're not doing enough? So that we go insane, questioning what's right or wrong, using so many of those bloody pseudonyms that you hesitate when someone asks your real name?"

"So that people who would gladly see us dead are stopped," said Zaf, searching the man's face. "For me, I do it so that when people look at me and accuse me of being a terrorist, I know that I actively prevent terrorism instead. You must have experienced that feeling of knowing you're doing the right thing, Matthew." Zaf had used the man's name like a friend might do.

"And you must be too naive to know what the Service is really about," he said coldly.

Zaf's shoulders stiffened. "Look at me, Matthew." The other man flitted his gaze to him. "Do I really look like I don't know what can happen to you in the Service?"

Matthew's face stayed calm but Zaf noted his eyes moving across his scars.

"So why do you still do it?" Matthew asked quietly.

"To protect my country from those who wish to harm it," Zaf replied.

"You've still got a life ahead of you, Zaf," said Matthew, moving his eyes away for a second, and then suddenly he was falling. Zaf felt the words_ 'and so can you'_ on his tongue as he watched the man plummet solidly into the water below as twelve o'clock drummed out from the cathedral.

Ros was swearing under her breath, leaning over, waiting for him to re-surface. The river was deep enough that he wouldn't have hit the bottom. Zaf watched the ripples of water from where Matthew had disappeared and wondered why he would have jumped, and why the busy bridge didn't even notice that he was gone.

"He is in fact Matthew Denham, previously worked in Section C, joined aged 18, but when he was 25 he left and never looked back," Malcolm informed them both through their earpieces, but the words didn't sink in for Zaf. His mind replayed the words and observations he had made over the last few minutes. He recognised the look in the eyes and the way the voice didn't sound human that this was a man who knew he was going to die. That, and the fact that Matthew's boots hadn't just been a few sizes too big: they had been stuffed with weights.

Ros' posture stiffened as Zaf told her this. She put her sunglasses back on her face and moved away from the bridge and the river, the ripples fading and blending with the rest of the water, leaving nothing left that Matthew had ever been there at all except for the tight frown on Ros' face and the lone tear that had strayed down Zaf's cheek.

"Whatever these messages are supposed to mean, they're twisted. And I want to find out who the hell is behind this," said Ros, her words venomous. Zaf nodded numbly but couldn't stop thinking of Matthew's face.

He remembered on one of his first proper missions at Five, he had tried to talk down an armed girl called Jeanette. She moved in a way that looked as if she was about to pull a weapon - armed forces shot her dead. He and Adam had then found that she wasn't even carrying a gun, but she knew they'd have to shoot her.

The expression on her face was something Zaf had never quite been able to shove to the back of his mind, and it was just like Matthew's face had been - the complete loss of hope.

Amongst the chatter of crowds and chirpings of birds, Zaf recognised the sound of his phone receiving a text.

"_Message received and understood? Get back to London."_

Zaf was tempted to throw his phone into the Seine along with Matthew, getting rid of any trace of this horrid mission which he had inadvertently become a part of.


	22. Chapter 22

"'Message received and understood?' the text said. But I don't understand." Zaf was finally able to update Lucas on the happenings in Paris. Ros and Zaf had returned to the Grid a few hours earlier and had been caught up in slogging through Matthew Denham's profile and the CCTV covering the bridge to try and find any additional information that they could about this former officer. Zaf noticed that Ros was hesitant to talk about what had happened to Matthew and noted to himself to check that she was okay – but subtly. He knew how Ros felt about expressing emotion.

"Matthew Denham was a senior officer. He was highly praised by all his colleagues. He said he left the Service because he watched too many good people die," Zaf continued, although whether the words were for Lucas or himself he was unsure. He understood Matthew's explanation as a legitimate reason to feel betrayed and depressed and horrified. But Matthew had been 45 years old - he had a wife, a lovely house and garden where he taught his son how to play football and knelt down planting flowers with his four year old daughter.

"Zaf, you remember the air hostess that you were flirting with?" asked Lucas suddenly.

Zaf raised an eyebrow. "Sure. Did you get her number?"

"She's married to a terrorist. She bugged my jacket."

Zaf felt his face move into a frown. "Why would she do that?"

"We can't be sure. But if she's involved in this she can't be trusted. I think she might be behind the messages."

"Who's the husband?" Zaf asked.

"Fahir Akbulut," replied Lucas. "Planted a bomb in London a few years back that MI5 managed to defuse and then disappeared, leaving only a voice sample."

"Fahir?" Zaf repeated, his voice sharp. The name was one that must be common, surely, but he definitely knew someone of that name...

"Yeah. This is the voice sample." Lucas clicked his mouse and the recognisable harsh tone resonated through the speakers.

Before the clip had even stopped playing, Zaf had started running.

His hands connected with the smooth marble sinks of the bathroom and he squeezed his eyes shut, reproducing the small amount of breakfast he had swallowed this morning with a bitterness clinging to his throat and a tight pain in his stomach. He leaned shakily against the edge and turned on the tap, watching the cool water rinse the sink clean. Zaf rinsed his mouth and then let the cool water spread across his hands. He forced a splash into his face and blinked hard, pushing away a slick layer of tears that had gathered in his eyes.

The knocking was firm and hurried. "Zaf? You in there?"

Zaf didn't reply, taking a few more seconds to steady his ragged breathing. Then he moved his feet in front of each other slowly to the door of the toilets, revealing Lucas leaning against the wall outside with eyebrows furrowed in concern.

"You okay?"

"Fahir. He was my torturer in Istanbul," said Zaf, annoyed at the obvious shakiness in his voice.

"Shit, Zaf, I didn't think-"

"It's not your fault," said Zaf instantly. "It was just a bit of a shock, hearing his voice again, y'know-"

"I do know," said Lucas firmly. Zaf was curious but didn't want to interrogate his friend, instead following him back to the Grid.

"Zaf, Lucas, you might want to see this," Malcolm called. The pair headed to his station.

"We've got a visitor outside," said Malcolm, pointing at his screen which showed the CCTV just outside Thames House.

"That's-" Lucas started.

"The air hostess-" Zaf murmured.

"Miss Ayla Akbulut," Malcolm finished. "The wife of our terrorist torturer. It looks to me like she's giving herself up."


	23. Chapter 23

"Name?"

"I'm sure you already know."

"Well, in this business we have aliases."

"Is that so, Richard Fox?"

Lucas was watching Dimitri interrogate Ayla from the live video feed set up in the meeting room. A part of him had wanted to be the first to see her, but he had no idea what her game was and knew she might manipulate someone she had already seen. Besides, Dimitri was a smooth-talker and not caught up in all of this, so Lucas agreed to let him have the first crack at her.

"Why are you here?" Dimitri asked.

"To help MI5."

"Help us how?"

"I have intelligence about a terror attack," Ayla replied. Lucas' frown deepened and he leaned closer to the screen, trying to read her facial expression.

"When?"

"Tomorrow."

"Location?"

"I do not know yet. I can contact the person planning it."

"Who is that person?"

"My husband."

"Hells bells, this is insane." Harry leaned forward in his chair. The whole team was gathered to watch; Harry, Lucas, Zaf, Ros, Malcolm, Erin.

"Why would she turn in her own husband?" queried Erin. Ros made no attempt to disguise her eye-roll.

"Do you see those massive rocks in her ears, Erin? Real diamonds. She's after money, clearly."

Erin cleared her throat and posed another question. "Why wouldn't she want to stop a terror attack anyway, regardless of money?"

"Because there are nice people and not-so-nice people, and the not-so-nice people don't care about the nice people getting blown up," said Ros in a patronising, sing-song tone. Erin leant back in her seat and didn't bother with a reply.

"What methods should we use to figure out if she's genuine?" asked Zaf. Lucas noticed how Ros' frown dissolved slightly at Zaf's rather intelligent question – it was also an immediate response to the issue at hand, and Ros loved immediacy.

"Lie detectors, threaten her family, give her the full audio treatment-" Ros stopped her list abruptly and suppressed a _'shit'_ as her eyes flitted somewhat guiltily over to Zaf at her brazen reference to torture. Lucas moved his eyes from the screen slightly to observe his reaction.

"Or, if she's a vain, money-grabber, we flatter her," Zaf proposed, glossing over Ros' comment easily, leaning to rest his arms on the table and look to Lucas for approval.

"Could be worth a try. Do you want her?"

"I think she was more taken with you, mate," Zaf smirked. "I'll let you have her. I've finally lost one with the ladies."

The meeting room still had an air of professionalism but Ros, Harry and Malcolm all relaxed slightly at the exchange of banter between two colleagues whom they thought they had lost.

"Okay. Lucas, switch with Dimitri. Zaf-"

"Hold on, I thought Harry does the orders?" asked Ros, stopping Erin in her tracks.

"I'm the section chief," she countered.

"I'm not trying to steal your position as Head Girl, Erin," replied Ros sweetly.

"I'll talk to Ayla. Erin, get the status report from our agent doing surveillance of the prison building, see if he's found anything new. Ros, head to the Turkish embassy and see what's on their schedule; Zaf, go with her. Malcolm, check through Ayla's possessions that were left with security, see if she brought a bug." Lucas reeled off the commands as quickly as he was able in order to stop a full-blown bullying session from Ros to Erin and then looked at Harry for agreement.

"Keep me updated," said Harry simply, rising from his chair and heading to his office.

_A few hours later_

Lucas' interrogation of Ayla hadn't gone badly. Partly because he was good at interrogating, but also she was being very cooperative. Perhaps too cooperative.

She had spoken coherently and her English was very good, but Lucas had also detected that she had been afraid. Maybe because she was betraying her husband and was scared of what he would do if he found out. Or maybe she was afraid of MI5 and their cold interrogation rooms. Or maybe she was pretending to be afraid and was just feeding them a stream of lies.

Lucas spun round once in his swivel chair and clicked his pen. The Grid was empty, apart from Malcolm tapping away in the forgery suite and Harry making phone calls in his office, armed with a frown. Lucas reckoned Harry chose his frown with his tie in the morning.

Why would Ayla lie about a terrorist attack tomorrow? She said it was planned for Oxford Street. It was nearing the end of November, so the streets would be packed with Christmas shoppers – an ideal target. Everyone would be working tirelessly to ensure the bomb didn't go off – distracting them from Ayla and Fahir's real plan?

It didn't seem right, though. Lucas didn't believe that everything she said was the whole truth, but he did feel that she wouldn't be working with him. The way that Ayla had described him was cold, and Lucas had had his fair share of bad relationships to recognise that tone. He had also experienced the good and knew how difficult it was to be critical and dishonest about someone you truly cared for.

Ayla had said that he was against the Security Services, but she didn't know why. Lucas knew he had planted a bomb in London a few years ago – she denied knowing anything about it.

Lucas rigged up the old missions files on his computer and tried to find details on Fahir's attempted bombing. It had been around five years ago now - the bomb was left outside Thames House. Lucas ran a hand through his hair, surprised at how close to home the attack had really been. Fahir being anti-Service had picked the perfect spot.

Five years ago - Lucas had still been in Russia. Harry would have still been frowning in his office, Ros wouldn't have been buried (twice) yet, and Zaf... hadn't been captured yet.

Zaf would have had a part in preventing the bomb that Fahir planted. Could they have come into contact with each other?

If they had, something about Fahir's aims had suddenly clicked into place in Lucas' head.


	24. Chapter 24

The day had reached an uncomfortably warm temperature as he headed outside on his lunch break to make two phone calls: the first was brief.

"Is she there?"

"Yes. Called me for the fake location about two hours ago."

"What did you give them?"

"Oxford Street – apparently will be very busy at this time of year."

"That ought to throw them off the scent for long enough. Good work, Fahir."

The second call was a little longer and more conversational.

"How have you been keeping?" he asked.

"Well, other than having to cope with the snivelling officers who are supposed to protect my country for 24 hours of each of my days, I'm doing splendidly." The other man's voice was dry. " How's Istanbul?"

"It's getting cooler, but still too warm in the day."

"Well, we're never graced with good weather in England, so I'd make the most of it."

"How are they finding the messages?" He was pacing outside, feeling the grass tickle the soles of his thin shoes. He enjoyed every chance to catch up with the messenger to discover how much the Service was squirming with uncertainty about what their messages meant. Sooner or later they'd figure it out, and he couldn't wait to see how they would react.

"Oh, they're confused out of their heads. We could have predicted this – MI5 don't really put common sense and decency on the job description."

A laugh, short and sharp. "When are you going to deliver the third?"

"Midday tomorrow," came the reply. "Are you ready?"

"Yes. I'll see you soon." He ended the call and placed his phone back into the pocket of his trousers, clapping his hands together.

Dr Polat headed back inside, ready to tend to another patient.


	25. Chapter 25

**A/N: Apologies for sporadic updates and many thanks to those who have continued to read/ review! I decided to split this into two separate chapters as I didn't want it to drag on too much...**

The Turkish Embassy was in South Kensington, no more than twenty minutes in the car, and Zaf was glad for the lack of traffic and high sun in the sky. He was also savouring driving his gorgeous convertible which he had missed - a flicker of a memory of him showing off to Adam about this very car flitted into his head and he couldn't help but smile.

Hell, he missed Adam.

Ros was applying a dark shade of lipstick using a compact mirror. Wearing a black blazer and skirt with sharp heels she looked every bit the sophisticated business associate - Zaf, on the other hand, was on the rota as a room service attendant after an unfortunate bout of food poisoning rendered four of the six elite helpers of the embassy too unwell to work. Zaf's invented and extremely impressive CV made him a perfect solution for this disaster than was in no way orchestrated by MI5.

Or, at least, no-one would _know_ that it was.

"So then, _David_," said Ros, glancing at him. "Where were you based before here?"

"I remedied a potential catering disaster in the Spanish embassy two months ago when an unrecorded nut allergy nearly halted the celebratory dinner," bluffed Zaf smoothly with a grin, carefully steering his car into a space and hopping out. The embassy wasn't far on foot.

"How about you, Sandra? How are international relations this time of year?"

"Wonderful, as always." Ros' heels clicked the pavement. "You go on ahead." She halted on the street, rummaging through her bag to buy time for the two of them to separate convincingly – it would seem odd for a room service attendant and a highly respected business associate to arrive together having a chat.

"Afternoon," Zaf greeted the guard and presented a sleek ID pass.

"If you like to go on through, Sir." Then, seconds later. "How can I help you, Madam?"

"I'm Sandra Durham, head of business associations for the Turkish Embassy involving international relations," Ros reeled off, even adding to the cover with a demure smile. "They're expecting me for four o'clock."

"Of course, Madam. Let me show you through to the waiting lounge."

Zaf overheard this as he was signing in at the reception desk. He caught Ros' reflection in the shining marble flooring and smiled.

As the tiny lady from reception led him towards the kitchens – Zaf was thrilled that he was in charge of sending up teas and coffees and biscuits to meetings – he was feeling increasingly hopeful that they could catch a whiff of whether anyone here knew of Fahir and any potential plans he may have.

_If you want to find out what's going on, go to the kitchens_, Zaf thought as he heard an overly-garrulous chef discussing with one of the waiters about how some drunken passersby caused outrage just last night across the street. It was a professional place (Zaf tugged at the black tie looped around his neck uncomfortably) but there was still an abundance of chatter and Zaf knew he could coax more information with his natural charm.

"Hi, Lucy." Zaf scanned the waitress' name badge briefly and smiled at her. "I'm David, new to this, and was hoping you could send me in the direction of the conference room?"

"Of course," she smiled.

"Thank goodness. I've heard the finance minister gets a bit hassled if he doesn't get his jammy dodgers right on three thirty," said Zaf lightly.

Lucy laughed. "Follow me."

Zaf was relieved that his charms hadn't worn off and that her eyes hadn't grazed the couple of scars remaining on his face. He followed her up the huge central staircase that spiralled off in two directions, coated in luxurious carpet. Huge chandeliers hung precariously from the high ceiling and the walls were light and airy. Zaf balanced the tray of goods and prayed he wouldn't miss a step.

"Just through here," Lucy whispered, gesturing to a door. "Let me know if you need any more help."

Zaf mouthed a thank you and winked, watching her disappear. The pair had been quiet as there was a loud, hurried conversation happening beyond the door - the voices sounded angry and when Zaf knocked to interrupt the chaos with a peace offering of biscuits, a rather irritated "Who is it?" resounded into the corridor. Zaf twisted the handle and entered the room.

"Ever so sorry, gentlemen. I was instructed to bring this to you." He laid the tray carefully down on the table in the middle of the gathering. There were three men; one tall and bald with a crinkled forehead, one of about Zaf's height and build with chestnut coloured hair, the final rather young with glasses balanced on the end of his nose and a suit with no creases. The room was incredibly large despite the small company, with the table large enough to seat thirty at least. Thick curtains were drawn back, revealing the bustling of London. Huge oil paintings added a decorative touch.

Of course, Zaf made all of these observations within seconds out of the corner of his eye as he plunked two sugars into the cup of the man with chestnut hair who thanked him, calling him 'David' as if they were friends. Zaf smiled and offered sugar to the other two gentlemen; both declined.

"Thank you," said the older, balder man rather dismissively. The young man with the glasses did not speak.

Zaf closed the door gently and tucked the tray under one arm, his feet drumming down the stairs back to the kitchens. The usual clatter that meal prime-time would provide had died down as it was the afternoon now, but Zaf's schedule indicated an afternoon tea taking place in Suite 5 in about twenty minutes.

Zaf checked that he was out of sight before activating his ear piece. "Alpha 2 to base, no sign of anything so far. Three angry Brits taking tea in the conference room but no signs of any Turkish relations talk yet," murmured Zaf.

"Brits?" said the voice. Zaf was surprised to hear Harry on his comms.

"Yeah. Didn't recognise any of them, though.

"We need to find out about our mole too – is there any way you can send us a visual on them so we can do a face-match?" asked Harry.

"Zaf, use the watch," instructed Malcolm.

"Okay, I'll try. Going off comms." Zaf deactivated the device. He and Ros had agreed that it was dangerous to use communications constantly in such a heavily-guarded environment and that they would limit their access to the Grid.

Malcolm's new wonder-gadget was the watch that Zaf was wearing buckled around his wrist that contained a camera and voice recorder. When he went to collect the empty cups and saucers, he'd be able to send over a good image.

Zaf paced the kitchens, offering smiles to those who looked his way, and wondered about the mole who had directed him and Lucas to that not-so-safe house where he had ended up getting stabbed. Zaf knew that Lucas had been instructed to tread carefully with any new faces that MI5 had been associating with, in particular those who organised safe houses, but it was pretty murky. It was likely that someone in that department actually passed the address on to Harry, but they wouldn't yet know who told them to do so.

"So..." He leant on the back of a chair and watched Lucy stack some plates. "How long have you worked here?"

"Nearly two years," she replied.

"You must be used to all of this political chatter then," he said easily.

"How do you mean?"

"Well, when I was delivering tea they were talking about something I've never heard of that could as easily have been a new brand of microwave for all I know." He moved beside her to take some of the plates which she was struggling to balance.

Lucy laughed. "Well, you get used to behaving well for people in high places."

"Who's the poshest person you've met here then?"

"Oh, I dunno. Served the Home Secretary a steak dinner when he was last here."

"How come there are so many Brits here?"

"Business associations and all that." Lucy flicked her hair and gave him an inquisitive look. "Why are you so interested?"

"When you spend a living arranging custard creams on a plate, Lucy, you tend to get the time to ponder things like this," joked Zaf. "Talking of which, I've got to serve afternoon tea in suite 5... is that the massive room at the end of the corridor?"

"That's the one," she said.

"Must be lots of business associates."

"You'll need lots of custard creams then," she replied with a grin.

Zaf paced back up the stairs, feeling the slight burn in his recently-recovered leg from the strain of so many steps that he intended on discovering the lift before any more journeys were made up this incredibly tall staircase. With a gentle knock and more smiles, Zaf carefully loaded the empty cup and saucers back onto the tray, adjusting his grip so that his watch got a good look at the three men. Their conversation seemed hushed when Zaf had arrived, and the young man had removed his glasses.

Zaf trundled back downstairs and dumped the tray in the kitchen, heading off for 'more tea towels' and sending the signal through to the Grid from his watch. He slung two tea towels over his shoulders for good measure when he returned, carefully placing them in their designated area of the kitchen.

His earpiece crackled to life. "Where's that tea?"

"You get tea?" Zaf whispered in disbelief, unable to disguise the jealousy in his voice.

"Suite 5. There are about thirty people so top up the milk."

"Sugar, Sandra? Not that you'd need any..."

Ros' dismantling of the comms was answer enough.

Still, Zaf knew that this meeting could potentially be the lead they were looking for in figuring out what Fahir was up to and how best to target him. He arranged the teacups, topped up the milk and artfully arranged a plate of biscuits, swiping one for himself on the grounds that he would need energy to keep up with this operation.


	26. Chapter 26

**A/N: The first half of this is very daft, but I don't think it would be completely improbable... (also, all of the identities I have given to any people in positions of government in this chapter are fictional)**

Zaf didn't have access to the images being sent through from Ros' brooch-camera but he could hear the conversations within Suite 5 through his earpiece as if he were in the room himself. From the amount of noisy chatter, he assumed that the proper talking hadn't begun yet.

"We're waiting for the Foreign Secretary, apparently," Ros whispered.

"Oh, hell," sighed Harry, the venom in his voice obvious. "Why on Earth wouldn't he tell me he was going to be there? Robert Camden is a force to be reckoned with."

"Good afternoon, everyone. Let's take our seats, shall we?"

"Speak of the devil," Harry grumbled. Zaf raised an eyebrow at Harry's reaction and wondered what it was that made his loathe the other man.

"No more communication until Alpha 2 arrives," Ros muttered.

"When are you due to go to the suite, Alpha 2?" Malcolm asked Zaf through the comms.

"Ten minutes," replied Zaf.

"Any chance you can delay? I don't think they'll start really talking this early on," said Harry.

"Unless I want to get fired on my first day, slacking is strictly unacceptable," said Zaf. "Unless... I can't be blamed for the delay."

"What are you thinking, Alpha 2?" asked Harry.

"Malcolm, switch off the CCTV in the kitchen - make it look like a glitch," Zaf instructed, making sure that Lucy and the other chefs were out of the way.

"Done," said Malcolm.

Zaf's eyes scanned the kitchen hurriedly. He needed to create a delay that would wreak havoc in the kitchen but leave the talks to carry on unharmed upstairs, so nothing too noisy, but something that isn't quickly solved...

A scrabbling at the back door interrupted him. Zaf peered out of the glass to see a bouncy Labrador hoping for some scraps from the kitchen – presumably it belonged to one of the workers.

Zaf gently opened the door and grabbed the dog's collar before it ran straight towards the tray of ham sandwiches perched precariously on the massive trolley that Zaf had loaded for the afternoon tea. He plucked a sandwich from a plate and placed it on the floor before the dog.

"You didn't see me here," whispered Zaf, patting the dog's ears and catching its name on the red collar around its neck. He laughed. "Lucky. How fitting."

Lucky chomped appreciatively at the sandwich on the floor but was eyeing the tray piled high with goodies. Zaf sauntered out of the kitchen, whistling.

"Hey, Lucy." He caught the young waitress after strolling nonchalantly for a few minutes, pretending he had somewhere to be. "Can you help me with the trolley for the afternoon tea?"

"Sure," she said, leading the way back to the kitchen.

"Oh my goodness!" she shrieked, helplessly watching Lucky leap at the trolley, successfully tipping a plate and its pile of sandwiches onto the kitchen floor.

"How the hell did it get in here?" Zaf cried.

"Shit, oh shit... David, I took the rubbish out about twenty minutes ago. I must have left the door ajar." Lucy's face was buried in her hands. "I'm so sorry, shit, oh, I'm gonna get fired-"

Zaf grabbed her wrists gently. "Hey, it was a mistake. Don't feel bad."

"Feel bad?! I'm finished, and I wrecked your-"

"Ssh." Zaf pulled the girl closer into a hug – she needed the comfort. A twinge of him felt bad as she was obviously distressed.

"Right, here's what we'll do. We'll say that Lucky got in by herself because the lock is faulty." Zaf flicked the lock of the door between his fingers repeatedly until it started to loosen a little.

"What about the CCTV?" Lucy pointed to the camera.

"When I was in here earlier the lights kept flickering, and the microwave's not working," said Zaf loudly. Miraculously, the lights snapped out as he said this. "See?"

_Thank you, Malcolm._

"The electricity must be dodgy," bluffed Zaf. "The camera will have cut out, so no-one will know that you left the door open. We tidy all this up, make more food and go up late, telling whoever Lucky's owner is that she's caused the kitchen a hell of a trauma."

Lucy paused. "How do you know the dog is called Lucky?"

Zaf heard Harry's sharp intake of breath in his earpiece.

"One of the chefs told me," lied Zaf smoothly. "She was pining at the door earlier."

Lucy nodded.

"Look, David, I can't thank you enough for helping me like this." She knelt down on the floor, gathering scattered sandwich pieces in her hands whilst Zaf ushered Lucky back out of the door.

The new sandwiches for the tray were assembled between them and twenty minutes after Zaf and Lucy had discovered Lucky's ravages he was in the lift, awaiting a scolding for being so late.

"Ah, finally. Must be new staff," someone muttered.

"I'm ever so sorry, ladies and gentlemen, there was a bit of a kitchen catastrophe. Mr Goddard, I'm afraid your dog got into the kitchen and destroyed a lot of property, along with devouring the original sandwiches. She's caused the kitchen something of a financial crisis with all her damage."

Zaf watched the man's face redden. "Heavens. I had no idea she could-"

"It's quite alright, Sir. Mistakes do happen. Someone will see you at reception on your way out," replied Zaf smoothly, manoeuvring round the table with the tray and pouring teas and coffees.

"Milk, two sugars please," said Sandra Durham softly, smiling at David.

Ros' coded message. She'd got some information.

Zaf nodded. "Certainly, ma'am."

...

"A dog? A bloody dog?"

Zaf couldn't tell whether Ros was incredulous or just a bit surprised that Zaf's devious set-up had been successful.

"It worked well," he replied.

"How did you cover it?"

"Malcolm knocked out the CCTV. I knackered the lock so it looked as if Lucky could get in."

"Do you have any idea how utterly ridiculous this sounds?" questioned Ros.

Zaf paused. "Yes." He laughed. "It worked, Ros. That's all that matters."

"I'm sure Harry will be thrilled to tell the Home Sec that not only were two of his officers snooping in the embassy, but one used the ambassador for Turkey's dog to buy time for the other to gain sufficient intel," quipped Ros.

"It makes a rather good story, don't you think?"

...

As soon as they stepped back onto the Grid, Harry cornered them: "What have you got?"

"I think everyone should hear this," replied Ros, unpinning the brooch-camera and handing it to Malcolm. Zaf unbuckled his watch and handed it over too so that they could access the images he picked up from the room of three angry Brits.

"They've clocked Fahir, but none of them want anything to do with him," announced Ros.

"But he's a Turkish citizen," stated Lucas, settling into a seat in the Meeting Room. "He's their responsibility, not ours."

"Well, they're not really intent on playing by the rules at the moment. According to our friend Robert Camden, the Turks are trying to secure a massive deal across the water."

"Where?" asked Harry.

"Need-to-know basis, and apparently MI5 who are currently trying to remedy the threat of a terrorist from their own bloody country doesn't need to know."

"I'm going to speak to Mr Camden immediately," growled Harry. "Lucas, I'll need you." The pair paced out of the room.

"So, what do they know about Fahir?" asked Erin.

"Not much more than us. They know he's anti-Service and that he planted a bomb here years ago. They also claim to have never heard of his lovely wife, Ayla – Dimitri, how's she holding up?"

"Pretty well for someone anticipating a terrorist attack tomorrow planned by their own husband," he replied. "She's unfazed."

"I want her talking; do whatever it takes," said Ros. Dimitri nodded and rose.

"What else do they know?" asked Zaf.

"They suspected he was based in an apparently abandoned prison which we've identified as your temporary residence," Ros told him.

"So why didn't they go and shut him down?" Zaf questioned.

"He wasn't really a priority and they didn't think he'd attack again after his failed bombing here."

"That would've only renewed his determination," said Zaf incredulously, leaning back in his chair.

"Zaf, you're involved in this quite a lot, so I don't think-"

"Excuse me?"

Erin halted at Zaf's sharp tone. "It's no-one's fault that they didn't get him."

"So, they knew of this whereabouts, they knew he was a terrorist, and none of this qualified for going in?" spelled out Zaf. "So I'm sorry if I have a little trouble understanding their incompetence, Erin." He got out of his chair and headed back to his desk.

Malcolm obviously noticed his anger as he perched hesitantly on the edge of his desk. "Do you want to know the names of those three Brits to whom you served tea this afternoon?"

Zaf nodded.

"The bald gentleman is called Alastair Cooper, the assistant of the Secretary of State for International Development; the gentleman with the glasses is Trevor Harvey, a translator who works mainly inside the Turkish Embassy, and the gentleman with the brown hair is Rupert Moore who works at GCHQ."

Zaf's forehead crinkled in a frown. "Why weren't they in the Suite 5 meeting?"

"Well, they were all invited," said Malcolm. "Perhaps they had something to discuss amongst themselves that they didn't want anyone else to know?"

Zaf nodded and bit his lip. "Okay. Thanks Malcolm."

Zaf flicked through the files of the three men but his eyes didn't really focus on the words. He knew he shouldn't have snapped at Erin, but it was infuriating that the Turkish wanted rid of Fahir (and rightly so) but wouldn't bother to do it themselves.

If they had acted sooner and arrested Fahir, Zaf would have been found sooner.

He nabbed her as she went back to her desk. "Sorry I snapped."

"I don't blame you; I shouldn't have been dismissive," said Erin, offering a smile. Zaf warmed his own face with a small grin in return.

Ros paced back out and rolled her eyes at Zaf's instantaneous acceptance of apology from Erin. Zaf had found it rather amusing how the two of them hadn't really hit it off – they were both competitive – but Ros' expression held a hint of concern.

"What's up Ros? Was my tea-making not up to scratch?" Zaf joked.

"You're burying how you feel about this for operational purposes," said Ros.

Zaf paused. "Of course I am." He paused again. "What do you expect me to do?"

"It's okay to be angry or upset about any of this – this guy is a vindictive sadist and you've had firsthand experience of that," explained Ros.

"Yeah, and I want him caught for it. So I'm not going to sit here and whine, I'm going to go and talk to one of these three and find out why they were absent from the meeting you were at."

Ros squinted at the screen. "Trevor Harvey? I doubt he's hiding anything. Appalling liar."

"How do you know him?"

"Bumped into him in the corridor. He said he appreciated the work that international relations were doing at the moment but his expression when he told me that suggested he thought the entire notion was utter bollocks."

Zaf exhaled a laugh. "Maybe I'll opt for someone else then. Rupert Moore has a share in a pub quite close to here."

"No drinking on the job, Zaf," scolded Ros, slipping into her swivel chair and reviving her computer monitor.

"Absolutely not," replied Zaf sincerely, grabbing his coat with a smile.


	27. Chapter 27

"Bloody weather, bloody traffic. When will there be a day when the sun is shining and the roads are clear and there isn't a bloody crisis we have to deal with?"

Harry was grumbling and the old Lucas would chip in with a funny comment, but Lucas just got into the taxi beside Harry and slammed the door.

"What exactly are you going to say to Robert Camden?" he asked, watching the taxi pull away from the kerb, wheels sloshing through puddles that were rapidly gathering on the London streets.

"How about 'Sort out your relations with your own bloody Service'- or would that be too discourteous?" Harry peeled off his leather gloves and looked at the other man. "This is turning into a nightmare."

Lucas nodded pensively and studied his shoes.

Harry cleared his throat. "Have you found anything else about this operation that I should be aware of?"

"Nothing concrete, but I've got a hunch," confessed Lucas, hesitantly moving his eyes to Harry who was awaiting an explanation.

"I was looking at the file for Fahir's attempted bombing outside Thames House," continued Lucas, "and it was arranged at the same time that Zaf was in the team. I think they came into contact with each other, and if they did-"

"Fahir would have known exactly who Zaf was when holding him in Istanbul," finished Harry, letting out a breath. "So this whole ordeal with the messages could be orchestrated personally against Zaf?"

"Or, Zaf could be the scapegoat for Fahir to try and take down the Service. I think it's gone further than just one officer now, Harry. I think he wants rid of the entire system."

Harry paused for a couple of seconds to digest this new information. "Don't tell Zaf," he decided. "He's been through enough already. Has he talked to you about Adam?"

"No," said Lucas, a little surprised at the question.

"They worked particularly well together. If he's a little distant with you, it's not because you've done something wrong."

Lucas held back a laugh. "Apart from getting him stabbed?"  
"Zaf's not one to hold grudges," continued Harry. "If he seems a little cold, he's just adjusting to the new environment on the Grid. He'll settle in soon enough."

"Unless these messages get to him," said Lucas darkly, watching rain droplets chase each other across the glassy windows.

"What about you?" asked Harry briskly.

"What about me?" Lucas asked.

"How are you finding this operation?" Harry was nothing but efficient and Lucas longed for a second that he would be asking about Lucas' personal wellbeing.

"Okay," he replied hesitantly. "I think we're making good progress. Malcolm's devouring the bugs – I think a part of him is hoping that a new bout of fieldwork will gain him another round of them."

"Some things never change," commented Harry lightly. Then a pause. "And some things do."

"Meaning?" asked Lucas quickly.

Harry let out a sigh. "Everyone's treading carefully around you, Lucas, because they fear you're going to be a threat to us again."

Lucas couldn't deny that Harry's words stung, but he was for once relieved for his bluntness.

"I know that, Harry. But I'm really not. I just want to sort this for Zaf's sake," he replied, but of course Harry detected the slight tremble in his words.

"I wish you'd met me first," said Harry softly.

Lucas nodded.

But Vaughn Edwards' manipulation had come before Harry's goodness, and there was not one thing that could be done to reverse it.

Harry clapped a tenner into the taxi driver's hand and clambered out of the vehicle, muttering curses at the rain and heading inside, Lucas at his heels.

Lucas was uneasy at being here. Of course, Robert Camden would know what he had done – Lucas was unsure as to whether he even knew that he was alive let alone back in the Service, be it temporarily or otherwise.

"Robert," Harry was saying all too soon.

"Harry." The other man took Harry's hand in a shake and gestured to the seat opposite his desk, moving his eyes towards Lucas.

"Harry, what's he doing here?" Camden's voice carried across his large office.

"This is Lucas North, he's helping out at Five with the current dilemma at hand," replied Harry coolly.

"Don't play the fool, Harry; of course I know who the man is. The last I knew was that you betrayed the Service and jumped to your death, Mr North."

Camden's tone was one of a headmaster scolding a naughty student. Lucas met his steely gaze and replied with "Well, my survival has been kept quiet rather effectively, then – we are a Secret Service, after all" before dropping into the spare chair next to Harry.

Camden scraped his eyebrows a good distance up his forehead at this audacious response but took his own seat, locking his hands together in front of him on the desk.

"How can I be of assistance?"

"I'm eager to know what it is that keeps you from revealing to MI5 where the Turks are trying to secure a deal abroad. And also, more prominently in fact, why the Turkish government are uninterested in one Fahir Akbulut, who is a citizen of their country and is repeatedly trying to wreak havoc here?"

"Oh, Harry," said Robert, "alas, I cannot tell you everything that goes on in confidential meetings with people I work with."

"Don't play the fool." Harry echoed the other man's words from a few seconds previous back at him. "He's their responsibility."

"Isn't your responsibility to protect this country from the likes of this, Fahir, is it?" replied Robert.

"Yes, I am fully aware of our agenda after more than thirty years in the Service," said Harry.

"Less of the sarcasm if you will, Harry," warned Robert, the condescending and superior tone reappearing much to Harry's distaste. "And he's hardly repeatedly caused chaos – I for one haven't even heard of him until now. He's obviously a low-level threat. Maybe you chaps at Thames House would realise that, if you didn't all go home at five thirty every evening." His tone was light, causing Harry to snap.

"This isn't a bloody joke, Camden. We have sufficient intelligence to suggest that Fahir Akbulut is planning a terror attack in London in less than 24 hours."

"What sort of attack?"

"A bomb in Oxford Street," cut in Lucas, sensing things were going to get particularly ugly in this game of one-upmanship.

"And how exactly did you ascertain this information, Mr North?"

"Fahir's wife, Ayla Akbulut, gave herself up for MI5 questioning earlier today," informed Lucas.

"And you're assuming that the word of the terrorist's wife is the undisputed truth, are you?" asked Robert.

"We believe that she has turned against him," replied Lucas.

"Oh, there's some good solid evidence. How do you know she's not just lying – another twist in the tale, you might say?" questioned Robert ruthlessly.

"There is a potential threat to a large number of lives, so it is our duty to act upon given intelligence," said Lucas firmly, leaning forward in his seat. "Better safe than sorry, you might say."

"I highly suggest that you liaise with your Turkish associates in order to give them this information. Perhaps they can chew it over and decide that they might have to get out of those luxurious chairs in Suite 5 to help us prevent a major terror attack." Harry rose from his seat.

"You had someone in Suite 5?" snapped Robert accusatively.

"We have people everywhere, Robert. I'd advise you to not screw this up, or you'll have the blood of hundreds of Christmas shoppers on your hands by this time tomorrow." Harry paced out of the room.

Lucas couldn't resist a slight courteous nod. "Mr Camden."


	28. Chapter 28

Zaf hadn't even realised that it was the first day of December. Then again, when you're in the middle of trying to prevent a major terror attack, festive celebrations are often forgotten.

He remembered Adam tacking up a massive team advent calendar one year which he obviously got for free somewhere and there was a raffle to decide who opened the door each day - Zaf had struck lucky and scored six of the little chocolates. He also remembered a certain Christmas party round Adam's and some inexcusable amounts of alcohol that were consumed.

This year, he had no advent calendar and an empty flat.

Zaf's recent physical assessment deemed that he was fit enough to move from the temporary accommodation suite in Thames House which he had been occupying since arriving back in England. His flat-hunting was brief and unenthusiastic; he opted for whatever was cheapest and closest to work. His new home was pretty small and cosy, but horribly quiet.

Zaf didn't have much time for pondering as he was taking in the sights and sounds of the busy London street. Of course, there were Christmas lights snaked around lampposts and decorating shop-fronts, and a deliciously crisp evening air and light patter of snow ensured that a wintery atmosphere was firmly in place. A couple of shops had Christmas music playing, different generic tunes mixing into one whirlpool of glorious sound. Zaf loved Christmas music and noted to himself to find all of his CD's in one of the boxes so that he could start celebrating Christmas – that, and buying several boxes of mince pies.

It was not a long journey from Thames House to the pub in which Rupert Moore of GCHQ had a share. It was called the White Hart, and being the fifth most popular name for a pub it wasn't particularly distinguishable from the many other alcoholic-based establishments littered across London that Zaf had been to. The windows were large and misty, flecks of snow clinging to the glass, and Zaf felt the warmness of the place as he opened the door, abandoning the chill of the evening for a cosier atmosphere.

Rupert Moore was invited to the meeting in Suite 5 earlier today but didn't attend, and Zaf wanted to know why.

Of course, the fact that he had a share in this pub wouldn't necessarily mean that he would be here, but at least Zaf could establish something about the man and at least if he didn't want to be cooperative it was a material item they could threaten him with, rather than a family member or friend. Fahir's bomb was scheduled for tomorrow, and if MI5 thought that Rupert Moore had any involvement they would use whatever means necessary to make him talk. Zaf understood this entirely but it made him uneasy bringing in other people and using them.

Trevor Harvey was fairly low-key, working as a translator based entirely in the Turkish Embassy. However, this would mean that he would potentially know about any happenings within the embassy. Erin had been sent to butter him up.

Alastair Cooper was the last person who didn't attend the Suite 5 meeting. He was probably the most respectable figure out of them all – Harry had given Ros specific instructions to tread carefully. Then again, treading in any region of safe ground wasn't always Ros' style.

Zaf took a seat on a stool at the bar and ordered a beer and a portion of chips, realising he hadn't had any sufficient amount of food all day. He had been able to swipe the occasional biscuit or sandwich from the kitchens as David but nothing that would constitute a proper meal.

The service was fast and Zaf was chomping chips when five minutes later a familiar looking man entered the bar. He efficiently shook the snow from his coat and hung it upon the towering wooden rack by the door, moving to take a seat in the large armchair opposite the fireplace which appeared to be reserved for him. One subtle glance in his direction and Zaf could confirm that this was in fact Rupert Moore. Rather coincidental, but Zaf was going to use it to his advantage.

Gathering the plate of chips in one hand and clasping his beer in the other, Zaf moved through the bustle at the bar to the quieter lounge area. The fireplace was full of roaring flame, the wood crackling in that irresistible sound that just spoke of winter evenings and marshmallow toasting. He placed his purchases on a small table and sunk into an armchair, watching the flames dance.

Zaf took one sip of his beer and spoke. "You're Rupert Moore."

The other man moved his eyes to Zaf's face. "You're MI5."

Zaf was a little stumped at this early response but continued regardless. "Yeah, and I'm not called David, either."

"So, what's a boy who was serving me tea a few hours ago doing interrogating me in my bar?" asked Rupert, leaning forward. His use of the word 'boy' was irritatingly patronising – the man was only a year or so older than Zaf.

"I want to know why you weren't in the meeting in Suite 5 today," said Zaf simply.

"I wasn't invited," lied Rupert smoothly, but Zaf knew otherwise.

"So, our record of your invitation by phone call three days ago was faked?" questioned Zaf.

Rupert paused. "This may be surprising to someone who works at MI5, but I have other things to do than attend meetings to help other people sort out their own problems."

"Such as attend a meeting with Alastair Cooper and Trevor Harvey to discuss something in a rather angry manner?" asked Zaf.

"Oh, well done. You've done a face match and looked up some names." 

"Well, we've done a bit more than that. We've spoken to Robert Camden actually, who wants your full cooperation in helping us with any questions we may have."

Zaf had lied but knew that name-dropping a figure much senior to both of them might just prompt Rupert into shedding some light as to what was being discussed in this little private meeting.

Rupert sighed in irritation, rubbed a hand across his forehead and moved his piercing eyes to Zaf's face. "Let's just say the British government are caught up helping the Turkish government and are ignoring some rather important agendas."

"Like Fahir's bombing scheduled for tomorrow?" Zaf asked, leaning forward in his chair.

"Who's Fahir?" asked Rupert tiredly.

"Doesn't matter." Zaf had taken a stab in the dark but it seemed Rupert's little meeting didn't involve discussing Fahir. "What agendas are they ignoring?"

"Oh, I wouldn't want to bother you with this; you've got this bombing nonsense to sort out." Rupert grinned, a wide sarcastic thing that incorporated his whole face in a stretched out, displeasing shape.

"Oh, I wouldn't want to have to threaten your share in this pub in order to get you to give information to us. Or your wife, or three children for that matter, who will have stopped tennis club for the winter now and so will all be at home having dinner – fish and chips tonight, I seem to recall - ready for the CO19 van I can send in immediately," said Zaf smoothly. It was scary how much they could find out about anyone and Zaf had been reluctant to threaten the family, but Rupert's facetiousness combined with secrecy was a rather lethal combination and suggested that asking politely wouldn't be an effective strategy.

"Now, Zafar," said Rupert, lifting himself from the armchair and clapping Zaf's shoulder with a leather-gloved hand. "I don't think someone who has experienced such horrific torture would have the balls to inflict it upon someone else." The smile was back. "Enjoy your beer." Rupert plucked a chip from Zaf's plate and played it between his teeth, moving to the door to re-envelope himself in his black winter coat before heading outside, the clatter of the door and breeze that had sneaked in being the only indication that he had been there at all.

What a bastard.

Zaf finished the chips, although they felt pretty tasteless now, and downed the beer, watching the snow swirl more insistently outside and wondered whether to call a taxi back to Thames House. He would have to explain this conversation in-depth and hope that Erin and Ros were having more success with Trevor and Alastair.

Zaf decided to embrace the snow, feeling the tiny flakes kiss his nose and hearing the crunch as his shoes connected with the frost-slathered paving slabs. The entire conversation with Rupert Moore had made him uneasy. What agendas were the government ignoring? Was he lying about never having heard of Fahir? How did a worker at GCHQ have enough leftover cash to invest in a pub? It also seemed awfully coincidental that Rupert had actually been at the bar on the evening that Zaf became aware of his connection to it. The whole thing felt pre-arranged, as if Zaf wasn't supposed to be there...

Someone else was.

Rupert's eyes had moved to the door too many times to escape Zaf's notice. He had hung his coat on the rack, expecting to spend a decent amount of time there. He hadn't yet ordered any food or even a drink. He had glanced at his watch as he left.

Rupert had gone to his bar that night to meet someone.

Next step: find out who.


	29. Chapter 29

**A/N: Lots of pondering but not much plotting as the team eat doughnuts and try to establish their next move. Feel free to leave a review - it'd be much appreciated!**

Snow. Lucas couldn't stand it.

It look picturesque on a Christmas card and pretty from a frosty window but actually walking through the stuff was not an enjoyable experience, especially as the stairs up to the roof were frail anyway without the additional hazard of ice and crunching snow beneath his boots.

It reminded Lucas of Moscow, which had always been bitterly cold but particularly so in winter. The prison window had allowed enough heat to chill his cell during nights, forcing Lucas to curl up shivering on the floor, praying for some warmth – preferably, warmth that wasn't boiling water thrown on his arms and legs. Oleg had convinced him it was compensation for the cold nights, but when Lucas' skin was raw and puckered it didn't feel like any form of reward.

London, on the other hand, looked strangely beautiful. After years staring at the four walls of a cell with a dissonant soundtrack of screams, Lucas gained an appreciation for simple things; the sound of walking crispy leaves, a sunrise and the smell of a roast dinner being among his favourites.

His stomach complained at the thought of food – he hadn't bothered to pay a fortune out of his already pitiful salary for a canteen jacket potato as an excuse for dinner. He and Ros had been in the Grid all day and they were into a good portion of the night now, searching for Fahir. Would he carry out the attack himself, or pay someone? It seemed impossible to guess, as he seemed to have a taste for blood but had enough funding to pay someone off to do his dirty work. They were monitoring all flights from Istanbul to any airport in the country, checking backgrounds of all passengers, but so far they hadn't found anything - Lucas had stolen a few moments away to stretch his legs and get some fresh air.

Despite Harry's insistence for them not to stay late (something about needing rested and objective officers, which Lucas could only assume was a joke considering the current stress they were all facing) Ros had given one look to Lucas that told him she wasn't going to be obeying this order, and Lucas' raised eyebrow in return told that he agreed. Ros had practically shoved Zaf in a taxi, declaring that he needed to rest up and Erin and Dimitri had left hours ago, but Lucas didn't mind that there were few officers on hand to track down Fahir. Working away with Ros at any hour of the night was something that Lucas missed about working here – she was company, but not the sort that would prattle on irritably nor question him about his current wellbeing. It was familiar and easy to be with Ros and it reminded Lucas of the 'good days'.

'Good days'. A term he had picked up at regular visits to Tring: Harry's orders. Diane Jewell looked permanently terrified of him but Lucas was making some sense of his doubts and fears, along with hearing stories from other residents of Adam who had apparently had the shortest spell there on record after storming out in under an hour.

Big Ben interrupted his musing: it was midnight. Lucas stole a few more seconds looking at the London skyline, gloriously alight and peppered with snowflakes which were falling harder now. Lucas shivered in his coat, stuffing his hands into his pockets and precariously treading back down the stairs into the Grid.

"Anything?" he asked, even though Ros' frown told all.

"Nothing at all. So either he's paying someone so innocuous that we'd never pick up on them, or he's completely invisible," said Ros, leaning back in her seat.

"Is it possible that he's already here?" asked Lucas.

"We'd have found him at the airport. And I did a background check on all supply ferries coming into the ports for the past month just in case he didn't want to travel the conventional way," replied Ros. "So I think it's very unlikely that he's here."

"What about another route?" pondered Lucas, leaning across Ros' desk to tap at the keyboard. "Check the files for any route from Istanbul to here, illegal or otherwise."

"Or, just ask me," chipped in a voice, moving to perch on the desk.

"I put you in a taxi four hours ago; how long have you been here?" Ros sighed.

"Not four, don't worry. Three, maybe. Three and a half?" Zaf handed both of them a cup of takeaway coffee and grinned.

"You need to rest," insisted Ros.

"And so do you, but you're not going to bother. I won't tell Harry if you won't. Insomniacs anonymous." Zaf opened the paper bag he had clasped under his arm. "Doughnut?"

Lucas smiled, claiming the one coated in the most sugar.

"So, this route. I think I know what it is." Zaf manoeuvred his swivel chair beside Ros' desk and reached for a doughnut.

"Care to tell us?" asked Ros sweetly, refusing to acknowledge the presence of the sugary snacks which were childish indulgences and not suitable for a working environment – Lucas made this deduction by her raised eyebrows.

"We discovered an illegal immigrant network into this country in 2005, organised by a Middle-Eastern Prince," started Zaf. "It was a truck that went from Istanbul through Bulgaria into Serbia, then into Austria and across the Channel by ferry. We put Adam in undercover on the truck because we knew the route was being used by Mohammed Yazdi."

"The Moroccan school bus bomber?" asked Ros.

"That's the one. We thought he was coming to the UK to lead up a major terror attack – turned out he wanted to assassinate the Prince."

"Was he successful?" questioned Lucas.

"Yeah. It was Juliet Shaw's smart idea to put the two of them in the same room together."

Ros' eye roll shook the entire room.

"Not her biggest fan?" quipped Zaf.

"Actually Zaf, she tried to kill me, so I don't think that's really a foundation for a solid friendship," said Ros bluntly.

"Seriously?" Zaf had paused mid-bite in disbelief.

"Do you want to finish telling us about this route or do you want to start telling stories?" asked Ros.

Zaf's expression told that he would much prefer to investigate the latter but he continued his story anyway. "So, we found this route and closed it down. Operation successful. But no-one's been monitoring it for years, which explains why you two have never heard of it. So, it could be up and running again."

"How the hell did you figure this out?" asked Ros, eventually resisting and reaching for a doughnut from the bag which was rapidly becoming emptier.  
"I've spent this evening tracking phone calls and emails in Istanbul in general to see if Fahir's in contact with someone here, and around the site where people met for the truck there have been a lot of enquiries recently about when the next route is running. I dug a little deeper and found that the truck doesn't leave monthly anymore as that was too easy to spot."  
"When was the last arrival?" Lucas asked.

"Just over a week ago," said Zaf.

"So he could be here already." Ros' frown dominated her entire face at the thought of having spent all night here searching for a man who was already in the country.

"Maybe, or he could be on one of these flights," offered Zaf.

"But he'd know we were monitoring them," said Lucas.

"And he told us that the bomb was set for Oxford Street. In his last call to Ayla he even threw in the time – it's set for midday."

"So why would he tell us all this? It must be a bluff," said Zaf.

"Or, he wants us all to be there," offered Lucas. "Because he knows we can't detonate the bomb. Imagine – several MI5 officers killed as well as civilians. It's the perfect strike against the Service."

"It sounds like our friend has taken inspiration from Davie King," said a new voice, laced with bitter undertones. Harry plucked a doughnut from the bag on Ros' desk and chewed thoughtfully. "Mind you, none of you were here for that debacle."

"Bright and early, refreshed to work?" Ros asked him.

"Well, I knew none of you would be sleeping. I thought I'd come and offer my extensive wisdom of having dealt with a sufficient range of unpredictable bastards over the years." Harry reached for a chair and parked himself next to Lucas. "What have you got so far?"

Harry's eye-rolling over the next few minutes of explanation would have put Ros to shame.

"So, we don't know if he's here yet or not, if the bomb is real or not, or whether he's physically carrying out the attack or not?" Harry shook his head sharply enough that it was a wonder it didn't separate from his neck, reaching for the last doughnut much to Zaf's distress.

"We need to cover all combinations; consider every angle," said Ros. "Lucas, if he's in the country already he'll have booked into somewhere close by – check all hotels within a ten mile radius of London for recent customers." She turned to Zaf. "I need you to get details of anywhere that might sell devices that could be manufactured into effective dirty bombs - check underground dealings here but also in Istanbul. If he came by the truck he could have packed the bomb but if he's flying he would have picked it up here. I'm going to lean on his lovely wife for any last drop of information she can remember. Harry, I need you to monitor the airport CCTV we've got in case he gets onto a flight."

"Rosalind, I may be older than you bright young officers but I'm your senior and have many more talents than simply monitoring surveillance, so don't be afraid to give me a more arduous task," said Harry.

Lucas looked at Zaf and caught his grin.

"Fine. Pressurise Camden. The mole who directed us to the unsafe safe house in Istanbul may well be involved in this attack – see what he knows." Ros clicked the biro she had been deftly spinning between her fingers, moving to check the CCTV for just one last time.

Lucas noticed the disappointment on Harry's face when he didn't have to end up calling Camden and barking orders down the phone, for Fahir was boarding a flight to Heathrow airport that would enter the UK at 6am today.

"_Got him."_


	30. Chapter 30

"Good morning, one and all." Dimitri's smile was cheery as always but he was stopped in his tracks at the sight of four knackered Spooks slouched at their desks.

"Coffee?" he said loudly.

Zaf had heard Dimitri but was trying to cling on to his sleep, but the prospect of caffeine was difficult to refuse. "Please," he called, moving from his chair for the first time in hours and feeling his shoulders creak.

"Did you all pull an all-nighter?" asked Dimitri, clattering mugs.

"Not as fun as it sounds, mate. No sleeping bags and ghost stories. Ah, those were the days." Zaf dropped a lump of sugar in his mug. "We were tracking Fahir's route into the country."

"Success?" asked Dimitri.

"Yep, we've got him. But it's only three hours until midday, so we've got chaos approaching rapidly. And seeing as you got a decent night's sleep, I reckon you can't shirk any responsibilities," Zaf joked.

"Actually, I was helping Erin figure out Trevor Harvey. He's difficult, but I reckon we've got some dirt on him."

"I had similar trouble with Rupert Moore," Zaf mused. "But Ros said we should leave the Brits for now and focus on Fahir. She didn't get much on Alastair Cooper either."

The kettle was singing now and Zaf and Dimitri clapped coffee mugs onto each desk. Malcolm responded with a cheery thank you, Lucas downed the scorching contents of the mug in one before pouncing on the kitchen for another, and Ros groaned and swore, lifting her head off her desk slowly and rolling her shoulders.

"Harry." Zaf knocked on his door softly at first, before risking everything and heading inside his office without permission. Harry was snoring loudly, leant back in his chair. Zaf wondered if waking up his boss would be an ordeal that he would survive.

"Harry," he said once more, loudly, placing the mug of coffee on his desk with a thunk. Harry jolted awake.

"I know we've just got you back, Zaf, but waking me up is a fatal error and I'd be happy to ship you off to another department as a result."

Obviously, fatigue had no impact on Harry's sharp wit.

"Message received and understood," said Zaf heartily. "It's three hours until the Oxford Street bomb."

Harry nearly choked out his sip of coffee. "Well, what are you standing there for?" He rose and readjusted his tie, following Zaf back onto the Grid.

"All eyes on everything at all times," bellowed Harry, met with an assortment of grumbles as the lethargy began to fade.

_10:00am_

"Two hours," said Zaf to no-one in particular, even though every officer had an eye on the time.

"He hasn't moved an inch," Dimitri groaned, standing to stretch his legs.

"Maybe he's not carrying out the attack," Lucas repeated for the third time.

"Why wouldn't he? It gives glory, and it's a direct hit against the Service," Ros pointed out.

"I agree with Ros. Why let someone else take the prize?" said Erin, tapping her biro against her teeth.

"He must be knackered though. He didn't sleep on the plane," commented Zaf.

"Who said something about knackered?" mumbled Lucas, gathering the mugs and taking charge of round four of coffee.

"The guilty don't often sleep," Ros mused. "And it'll work in our favour if he's tired, because he'll be prone to mistakes."

"I'm not so sure. He must have planned this well – I don't think a missed night's sleep will work against him," replied Dimitri.

"Someone please inform me I have something substantial to tell Robert Camden," said Harry, adjusting his cufflinks. "He demanded a brief and it'll be a very brief brief at this rate."

"Nothing yet," said Erin apologetically, watching Harry pace away.

"We're wasting our time," decided Lucas.

"I know you love playing the pessimist Lucas, but-"

"No, Ros. We're wasting our time," said Lucas again, slowly. "Fahir stopped for breakfast at the airport. He's in a hotel hanging up his clothes. He's wasting his time, and he's wasting ours."

"What are you saying?" asked Zaf.

"You wouldn't be this relaxed if you were about to kill potentially hundreds of people. You wouldn't give your wife the location, knowing we'd just evacuate everyone. You wouldn't do anything like this if you were guilty."

"Are you saying he's not guilty?" asked Dimitri incredulously.

"I'm saying he's not guilty of an Oxford Street bomb today."

"So, what's he doing here?" asked Erin.

"Well, it'd be too easy if we knew that now," replied Lucas.

"Could be here for a meet," Erin suggested.

"Why come all this way though, and plant lies about an attack?" pondered Lucas.

"Misdirection," Zaf concluded. "There's no bomb, there's no strike against us."  
"What next, we all join hands and run off into the sunset?" said Ros drily. Then, more gently: "It just seems a bit too convenient, Zaf. I don't believe he'd fabricate something this huge just as a distraction."

"Agreed," said Erin. "We keep the bomb squad on site, and Malcolm if you could continue with the CCTV that'd be much appreciated."

"My pleasure," said Malcolm, readjusting one of the screens and leaning back in his chair, seemingly the only team member relaxed and rested.

"What would he want to distract us from?" Zaf threw the question out but was a little hesitant to receive an answer.

"Another attack?" suggested Lucas.

"Rescuing his beautiful wife?" Ros said, as if the very notion was entirely boring.

"He's making a call!" Malcolm called triumphantly. The team dragged themselves into the forgery suite.

"I'm here," said Fahir.

"Can you track where the call is being made from?" Lucas hissed.

"I'm doing it," said Malcolm patiently, his fingers flying across the keys.

"Okay." Fahir snapped the phone shut, cutting off Malcolm's tracer.

"Damn it!" he cried.

"Anything?" asked Erin hopefully.

"Well, the caller is not in the UK, that's all I can be sure of," sighed Malcolm. "And I doubt there's any secret message going on between the two judging by the non-descript nature of their conversation."

"Was he getting orders?" questioned Zaf. "Is he really just a foot soldier?"

"Might be a joint effort. An ally. Someone back home," proposed Lucas.

"Whatever's going on, we can't compromise national security. If this bomb is real, we have to stop it, and unless we find out solid evidence that it isn't a genuine threat then we don't move our eyes away from Oxford Street," said Ros.

Zaf headed back to his desk and watched Fahir move about his hotel room, so at ease that Zaf felt his fists clenching. He could be about to commit mass murder but wanted to toy with them, make them wait. Of course, Fahir would know he was being watched, but his confidence was infuriating.

Fahir was a man who knew he was winning this particular game.


	31. Chapter 31

_11:15am_

"Eyes on our target, Fahir Akbulut, at all times. If any one of you thinks he's up to something report immediately." Ros' voice was efficient through the comms but Lucas knew she would be feigning composure. She had been in charge of neutralising a bomb threat a couple of years ago and three devices were disabled, but one was detonated and killed two C019 officers - she had later told Lucas that she was annoyingly competitive and that it had thoroughly pissed her off that 'the bastards got one past us'. Getting this one right wouldn't erase it, but Lucas knew she deserved a little good news and would not only want to protect civilians but Zaf too. He had never once complained and was a brilliant officer, Lucas was coming to realise, but the psychological damage that Fahir had caused him was not to be ignored; however, with the recent events having snowballed there wasn't time to question his wellbeing. The Service expected officers to be like machines during operations, pushing aside any personal feelings that may jeopardise a task: only when the civilians were safe would the officers have a chance to recover. Lucas knew it was a path they chose but it felt cruel nonetheless - Zaf seemed to be coping, but Lucas knew probably better than most how deceptive people could really be. How long would it be before Zaf stopped being able to put on a brave face?

"Harry, I want another officer on the ground," Lucas heard Ros say.

"Non-negotiable. He'll know."  
"He's not trained in counter espionage."

"As far as we know. You've got Lucas – use him." Harry's tone was one that brooked no further response on the matter.

"How's it going, Alpha 1?" Ros asked him.

"Busy. No sign yet."  
"He's still in the hotel," Malcolm chipped in.

"Okay, do we know how he's going to detonate?"

"I doubt it's remote, because no such device got flagged at the airport - unless he's picking one up here, I would suspect timer. Manual is a possibility, but he said it was set for midday so I don't think that'd be the option he'd utilise."

"So let's work with timer then. I want to know exactly what Fahir is doing for the next forty minutes and monitor anything out of the ordinary in the next forty minutes happening in Oxford Street."

"Zaf's got CCTV and there's nothing so far," Ros reported.

"The bomb can't be in the area yet, I've done a scan and there's been no unusual activity picked up from the surroundings," commented Malcolm. "And he must have retrieved the device here because airport security would have stopped him otherwise."

"Has he met with or talked to anyone since arriving?"

"Other than the mystery caller, no-one," informed Malcolm.

"Is there any way you can find out who he was talking to?" Lucas was desperate for something proper to work with.

"I've still been running a trace but without much luck; I know the call was made from somewhere in Europe but it won't be easy to narrow it down."  
"How long would it take for an exact location?"

"A day at least."

"We haven't got a day!" Lucas shouted, disguised by the sounds of the busy shoppers.

"Alpha 1, you're on the ground so don't throw a tantrum," Ros reprimanded him swiftly.

"Sorry, Malcolm." Lucas drew some quick breaths. "What else can we do? Evacuation?"

"It'd be too messy and if there's a fuss for nothing the Home Sec will have our necks."

"More so than if he's got a hundred corpses?" Lucas snapped, running a hand through his hair. "We've got to do something."

"Kill Fahir," was the reply, but the voice didn't belong to Ros.

"Zaf," she said. "We'd need a direct order."

"So let's get one," he replied, making it seem like such a simple option.

"Could we?" Lucas asked.

Ros hesitated for a fraction of a second but Lucas caught it. "Yes, we could. But I'd much rather have him alive so we can find out what he's doing. If he's just a foot soldier then his boss will just carry on without him."

"We can't risk civilian casualties," Zaf insisted. Lucas knew the subtext of what Zaf was saying: he didn't want him alive because of what he'd done to him. Perfectly understandable, but operationally that reason just wouldn't cut it - Lucas knew that and so did Ros as she replied: "Killing him doesn't guarantee the bomb won't go off if it's on a timer."

'_So? Just kill him anyway.' _Lucas could almost hear Zaf saying it, but Zaf had the decency to stay silent and accept Ros' decision. His suggestion of exterminating the man, however, had sparked worry in Lucas - his friend was usually the last to suggest such an extreme option and now it seemed the physical and psychological damage inflicted upon him by the other man had been catching up, manifesting itself into a want for revenge. Lucas gritted his teeth and tried to blot out the pain his friend must be feeling as well as a sudden, unwelcome wash of Russian memories.

"I want him alive," she reiterated, snapping Lucas back to the present. "This bomb does not go off."

"He's moving!" Malcolm declared.

"Where's he going?" asked Lucas, pacing along Oxford Street again for any sign of anything out of the ordinary.

"He's gone to a cafe," Malcolm said. "It's a meet."

"Who with?" Lucas demanded instantly.

"He's got his back to the cafe's CCTV."

"You have got to be joking," Lucas muttered venomously. "At least tell me you've got audio."

"It'll take a few seconds- oh, dear." Malcolm's voice had adopted a panicky tone.

"Malcolm, what is it?"

"Fahir's friend had just handed him a remote detonator."

"Right, this is Charlie 1 to all units. Suspect is now in possession of a remote detonator, I repeat, remote detonator. The bomb could go off whenever he chooses." And then Ros said to Malcolm: "We can't let this happen. Take down the mobile system."

"It'll take time that we don't have," said Malcolm worriedly.

"Malcolm. Do. Something," said Ros.

"I can cut all signals within a quarter-mile radius from the cafe for around ten minutes," Malcolm offered. "It'd block the signal if he tried to detonate by remote but it'd also mean we'd lose the CCTV and audio of them."

"Do it," Ros responded instantly. "That bomb does not go off. Lucas, get to that cafe."

His pace had been steady to match that of the crowds but now he broke into a jog, weaving slowly through the swarms of shoppers until he thankfully reached a less busy section of street, feet slamming the pavement steadily.

"Five to twelve, how close am I Malcolm?"

"Just under a mile. The signal cut is working but we won't be able to tell if he's attempting to detonate. Hurry, Lucas."

"Ros, are the bomb squad still at Oxford Street?" he breathed.

"Yes, but they've found nothing."

"It can't be real," said Zaf. "We would have found something, surely?"

No-one got time to answer his question, as Lucas had reached the cafe. Feet slowed, breath coming fast, he peered into the window for the table at which their terrorist and friend were sitting.

One waitress, clearing away crumbs.

"This is Alpha 1. Suspects are not here," Lucas reported, looking at his watch and helplessly staring at the hands marching towards midday.

"I repeat, suspects are not here - and the bomb goes off in one minute."


	32. Chapter 32

Zaf became acutely aware that his hands wouldn't stop shaking.

Ros was chewing her lip, eyes wide.

Malcolm had slumped forward, head in hands.

Silence.

"That can't be right," Ros murmured after a few seconds, glancing at her watch before speaking again. "Alpha 1, report."

"Nothing," was all that Lucas said.

"Alpha 2?"

"All quiet," came Erin's response.

"Alpha 3, did something detonate?"

"Negative, Charlie 1. No detonation."

"What the hell is going on?" Ros hissed, but she didn't have the time to push for further details as Harry was coming through the pods, a frown etched heavily into his face.

"Ros," he said once, quietly.

"No bomb," she told him.

The whole room let out the breath they were holding.

Zaf ran his hands across his face. Of course, he was relieved that there was no bomb and no trauma and no deaths, but it proved that this whole thing had been a smokescreen: Fahir had other intentions.

"The remote detonator," he said softly, and then laughed once, but the sound was mirthless and bore no resemblance to his former light-hearted chuckle. "He knew we would assume it would be how he'd detonate and that it'd make us take down the network-"

"So we couldn't watch what he was doing," Ros finished icily.

"Well you'd better find out what it was that he was doing, and quickly," Harry snapped.

"Lucas, he was meeting someone. Before we cut off the CCTV we got an image from the back but the camera was in black and white-"

"Describe him," Lucas demanded.

"Yeah, I was just about to, thanks," she quipped, although Zaf could tell her heart wasn't really in it and that it was just instinctive to reply sarcastically. "About six foot, dark hair, dark jacket and a rucksack."

"Ros, you just described the majority of the people that I am currently surrounded by. It's midday, so the workers have come out for lunch and they've all brought their jackets because it's bloody freezing."

"Alphas 2 and 3, head to the cafe and see if you find anyone matching that description on your way," instructed Ros, ignoring Lucas' comment. "Alpha 1, check to see if the cafe has a back entrance that they could have left from and then go and do a search of the place - check the table they were at." Ros pulled off her headset.

"Fahir's back at his hotel room," Malcolm added.

"We need to bring him in," Harry growled.

"Misdirection, plain and simple," said Zaf. "He knew we wouldn't compromise national security and had to consider the bomb threat as real, taking our eyes off his real aim."

"Which we were unable to establish due to focussing all our resources on attempting to neutralise the bomb that was never there." Ros' anger was becoming increasingly evident.

"Ros, I understand your frustration but we can at least be thankful that there was no bomb and no-one was killed," Harry reasoned.

"But we're back to square one for Fahir's intentions," Ros almost hissed. "He's wasted our bloody time."

"Let's wait to see if Lucas finds anything at the cafe," Harry replied.

"Maybe we can have tea and cake," Ros said, her voice brazen and with obvious sarcasm: her speciality.

"Ros, just bring Fahir in."

...

He could close the cafe for a while with one flash of his ID card but there was no point in stirring up unnecessary trouble, so Lucas strolled in and took a seat in the same chair that their terrorist had sat mere minutes ago and ordered a double espresso.

If Fahir was so intent on toying with them, he might have given them another false clue - Lucas ran his hand under the table looking for a note to dislodge but was met only by rough wood under his fingertips.

"Want a pastry or something, love?" the waitress asked, placing Lucas' coffee in front of him.

"Yeah, a pain au chocolat please," he decided, thinking it wise to relish the time for a snack before working tirelessly when he got back to the Grid.

Lucas picked apart the pastry in his hands, licking a smudge of chocolate from his thumb and reaching for a napkin from the metal box on the table. He stopped chewing, flipping over the flimsy napkin and reading what was scrawled upon it.

_Message 3: 0125040732._

_More bloody numbers?_ he thought, willing for his mind to understand them. He reached for the biro in his pocket and rearranged them swiftly.

_3.207042501 _

Zaf's numbers.

"Hey Zaf," Lucas spoke into his phone. "Got some numbers."

"Please say it's a mobile number with Fahir waiting at the other end to tell us all of his plans," Zaf replied.

"Oh, that'd be too easy. It's weird though – it's an anagram of your numbers."

Zaf paused. "That is weird."

"It's written on a napkin – I'll bring it back to the Grid to see if we can lift any prints." Lucas snapped his phone shut and shifted in his seat, squinting slightly as the sun moved across the sky and glinted off the cafe window. It was fairly weak, barely able to dissolve the snow still clinging to the streets, but bright enough to force Lucas' gaze down on the table.

_0125040732_

Why did that look familiar?

He had reached for a sip of his drink but the espresso never found its way to his tongue. Hand frozen in mid-air, Lucas pieced together the tiny fragments of puzzle that had been drifting in his mind and reached for his phone.


	33. Chapter 33

"3.207042501," Lucas said, scrawling the numbers on the plastic board the team sometimes used for pinning photos from operations. "And the third message: 0125040732."

"Is this going to be like a high school maths lesson?" Ros asked sweetly.

"Separate the numbers out into pairs," Lucas murmured, writing _01 25 04 07 32. _"Anyone?"

"Not the foggiest," Ros replied.

"It's a time and a date," Lucas explained slowly. "The 25th of April at 7:32 in the morning."

"What about the 01?" Zaf asked.

"The first picture." Lucas clicked the lid back on the board pen.

"Picture of what?" Ros asked impatiently.

"Sunrise." Lucas watched Zaf's face move in recognition and the fear appearing in his eyes as he pieced everything together.

"Right, well you two might be mathematical whizz-kids but could you please elaborate for the bottom set?" Ros requested, gesturing to the confusion displayed on her own face as well as Dimitri and Erin's.

"In Istanbul, we stayed at the residence of Kerem Polat. He's a doctor, as well as a keen cook and photographer. He's also very rich indeed. We were directed to his home as an impromptu safe house after discovering the owner of our first one was trying to kill us. Every morning, he takes a picture of the sun rising from his back garden."

Ros couldn't resist an eye roll. "Life and soul of the party."

"He showed me one of these pictures, and I noticed the date and time in the corner of the photograph," said Lucas. "He's done it for years and pins them up on the walls for some unusual decor and there are several layers of photos – it was the first layer. He must have rearranged the numbers as some sort of a code for his associates."

"He's very rich," Zaf repeated. "And this whole operation has been very well funded – the surveillance, the sophisticated bugs..." He tailed off, obviously in distress.

"He's involved," Lucas said, taking a second to digest this himself. "I can't believe he's involved." He ran a hand through his hair. "We've been played from the start in every aspect of this op. They've got control of everything we've been doing."

"Sorry to interrupt," Malcolm interjected politely. "But aren't we missing something?"

"What is it, Malcolm?" Ros asked.

"Why go to so much trouble to get someone to a photograph?"

"Because it's got a message." Lucas rubbed a hand across his face. "The messenger said there would be four messages, and we've only had three. Dr Polat has the fourth."

"Why would he tell you though?" asked Zaf quietly. "He showed you the picture; he basically told you that he was involved. Why do that if he's against us? And if you utter the word 'misdirection' I will blow someone's head off." Zaf had spoken calmly but his words were malicious, and Lucas couldn't blame him - they'd all been deceived by Fahir and Dr Polat for a very long time but it would be particularly painful for Zaf having had first-hand experience of Fahir's ways.

"I can only assume that if he wanted us to find out that he was involved, his intention would be to give us false information of some kind," replied Lucas.

"So, has he been running all of this?" Zaf questioned.

"It would appear so."

"I still don't understand," said Zaf. "When I was in Fahir's torture suite I heard him talking to someone and they said those numbers - I guess now I can assume that that person was Dr Polat. It was a code, yes, but why let me hear it? They could have just knocked me out or killed me, but I heard them say it."

"They might have assumed that you were too scared or injured to remember," suggested Ros softly.

"Would they really take a risk like that though?"

"I don't know, Zaf," said Ros honestly; in perhaps the gentlest voice Lucas had ever heard her use. "I just don't know, but we'll find out."

"How?" he asked, voice cracking.

"We've still got Ayla," she said darkly. "We can do whatever it takes to break her."

"And then we're just like Fahir, Ros. We'd be just like him," said Zaf venomously, his eyes locked on her face. She lowered her gaze.

"We still need to find the mole that sent us to his house in the first place," said Lucas quietly, carefully breaking the silence that had descended.

"I think I can help with that." Harry's voice was entirely toneless.

"How?" asked Ros.

"Trevor Harvey has just been found dead: suicide. It's a confession."


	34. Chapter 34

The Turkish Embassy didn't provide an awestruck sensation at the grace of its interior design nor the tingle of adrenaline at the thought of a mission when Zaf stepped upon its carpet for the second time in a week, knowing that when he climbed the stairs it was to view a body rather than provide tea and cakes. He and Lucas had been swiftly elected by Harry to check out the scene for anything suspicious before the paramedics quietly removed the body, leaving the Embassy to carry on in its bubble of professionalism and splendour with only a few superiors in the know about what had happened.

Zaf showed his ID card to the man outside Trevor Harvey's room and offered a detached nod before nudging open the door, drawing in a sharp breath at the sight that followed. Fortunately, the death wasn't of a particularly bloody nature but the sight of the body strung up from the ceiling still brought a tingle of nausea to Zaf's stomach, followed by the unease he felt at contemplating such a death. Suicide was something Zaf had never really understood, seeing life as a gift and an adventure and something to be savoured through highs as well as lows, but after watching Adam almost self-destruct and gathering a snatch of dark feelings over the past couple of years, Zaf could piece together the reasons behind someone wanting to escape. However, for Trevor Harvey, the reasons behind his suicide were yet to come to light – as they were leaving the Grid, Erin had began checking for dodgy finances and Dimitri was digging up relationships in the hope of revealing some reason that prompted Trevor into such a seemingly sudden decision.

The scene of the death had been left completely undisturbed from Harry's orders following Robert Camden's hasty phone call to deliver the news, but the body still hanging in his final position was an unnerving sight and Zaf was relieved when Lucas gave the paramedics the nod to remove it from the room.

"What do you think?" Lucas asked quietly, watching Zaf's eyes scan the small room in which Trevor Harvey had occupied regularly throughout the year or so of working at the Embassy.

"The room looks tidy enough to suggest he wasn't distressed or provoked suddenly into acting," Zaf offered. "I imagine this was pre-meditated."

"Hm," Lucas replied in affirmation. "If you're suicidal you plan everything meticulously." Zaf watched Lucas peel back the curtains for a brief glimpse outside before pocketing the mobile on the windowsill. "Let's see if he made any goodbye calls – he would have had friends or family somewhere."

Zaf nodded but the gesture felt half-hearted, as he was struggling to comprehend the peculiar timing of this event. It would indicate that Trevor was the mole, that perhaps he had been discovered and chose death over a lengthy prison sentence or living with a chilling conscience, but MI5 had had no such indication that he had been caught out. In fact, Harry and Ros had come to a joint agreement to focus on Fahir and try to entrap the mole at a later date. Also, the operation seemed to be rearing its ugly head – why would the mole, the crucial traitor, kill himself before witnessing the end of all his work?

"He must have had a guilty conscience," said Lucas, as if hearing what Zaf was thinking.

"Why do you say that?" he asked.

"He could have gone under the radar. When Erin looked into him, he appeared totally innocuous which in light of recent events would suggest to the contrary so he could have easily vanished after this. But he chose not to, indicating that his involvement was prominent enough and terrible enough to make him want to take his own life."

"Either that, or he really was just innocent? Zaf dared to venture his thought.

Lucas paused before replying. "You don't think he's the mole?"

"I don't know. But I don't see why he'd give in just before we got the final message," Zaf explained. "I've not really experienced moles much, but if I was one - and I'm not saying that would ever be a path I would even consider as I think it's the lowest form of treachery - I'd want to see out the ripples caused by the rock I'd thrown." Zaf had used a metaphor because he was struggling to fully communicate the worrying hunch that had started to tickle his uneasiness. "It just feels out of place. But obviously we can't just act on a hunch that's probably just fuelled by my own paranoia." Zaf headed for the door, watching the paramedics cover the body with a sheet to prevent distress for sensitive eyes during its final journey through the Embassy.

"Wait," he said, once, authoritatively. Zaf moved towards Trevor's head, studying the harsh scarlet and purple loop around his neck which blended unevenly with the rest of his pale skin.

"Lucas," he said worriedly, gesturing to the fatal wound. "Look at the marks. Shouldn't they be more evenly distributed?"

"How do you mean?" asked Lucas cautiously, reluctant to approach the body, the by-product of hanging, as this was a fate that he had once considered and didn't particularly want to think about in detail.

"There's rope burn, but not here." Zaf didn't touch the body but gestured specifically enough for the bruising to catch Lucas' attention. Sure enough, just above the red scratchy ring were harsher, purple tones, indicating a much stronger force having been applied.

"We'll have to wait for hospital reports, obviously," started Zaf quietly, "but is it me, or does this look very much like strangulation?"

"It does indeed," Lucas said darkly, a prominent purple oval indicative of a thumb digging into the skin being particularly worrying. "A noose wouldn't leave marks as harsh as some of these."

"He was murdered," Zaf said, his voice uneasy and quiet enough to be interpreted as a question.

"I think he was," Lucas replied in a tone just as low as to not be heard by the paramedics who were now gathering closer, adamant to remove the body as quickly and quietly as possible.

Zaf swallowed hard as he and Lucas paced back downstairs after having called in their suspicions to the team. The body had made him feel unsettled, but the majority of his upset stemmed from the continued deception he had been living under whilst battling to fight his own demons. Fahir would have been easier to digest had his motives been stewing for a while, allowing Zaf to breathe more easily and rearrange the jigsaw of his thoughts, but his horrible intentions were forced down Zaf's throat and he hadn't been able to digest everything that was going on. It was misdirection, and it was nasty, and it seemed to be aimed at him. But why? Of course, it was deeply painful to feel accused of something, but Zaf had also began dwelling on his capture late at night and was becoming increasingly panicky as to whether he revealed any intelligence when delirious from the pain of his torture. He had convinced himself that being actively involved in this operation would reignite his passion for protecting his country whilst giving some closure for his ordeal, but it had been more difficult than he had first anticipated and he didn't know how to reach out for the help that seemed to be drifting further and further away as each new chapter of Fahir's blockbuster was turned. He didn't want to deviate from the operation, because he felt it selfish and unprofessional, but he was beginning to realise that he hadn't been coping – his body exhausted and wounds still sore and not easily combated with regular medication; his mind a bitter soup of grief, anxiety, terror and revenge to name a few unpleasant feelings currently clawing at his sanity. Zaf tried to tell himself that a few more days would lead to the end of all of this and give him sufficient time to breathe, recover, and move on. But that luxury of wellbeing was getting thrown back by weeks by each new scrap of information that they uncovered and it was a thought that made Zaf's skin crawl for a reason he couldn't entirely identify; the closest attempt that he could give was that of the beginning of complete loss of hope.

His feet along with Lucas' were still drumming down the stairs, out of the Embassy and away from Trevor's suspicious decline, but no matter where he moved his feet, Zaf couldn't shake away the demons of his capture who loved to play chase.


	35. Chapter 35

"Do you want the good news or the bad news first?"

"Bad," Harry grunted.

"Trevor didn't kill himself." Lucas decided to approach the issue directly and ruthlessly rather than tiptoeing around it – the team were knackered enough and Lucas doubted their patience would withstand a gentle and hesitant response to the newest problem in their pile of plenty.

"What?" Ros asked, although it wasn't as venomous a response as Lucas had anticipated; as it was evident that even Ros' sarcastic tones crumble a little after 36 hours of non-stop chaos.

"Well, obviously we'll have to wait for an autopsy but we think he was strangled," said Lucas, and Zaf nodded. Lucas was fine with briefing everyone, especially as Zaf had been looking rather unwell since arriving back. Physically, he was paler and Lucas caught the slight tremors of his hands, but his expression also held a terror that Lucas had experienced too many times.

"So, he's not the mole?" Dimitri asked.

"He could be, although I think it's more likely that it was the actual mole that killed him," concluded Lucas.

"To stop us searching for them because they knew we would assume it was Trevor," Erin said.

Harry rubbed a hand across his forehead. "The good news?"

"Well, I wouldn't say it's good, but it's advancement for the op," Lucas started.

"Spit it out," Harry barked.

"I've checked Trevor's phone and in the last 24 hours he made six calls to Mr Alastair Cooper."

"Right, well I think it's about time I took that bastard out for dinner again," Ros sighed.

"Tread carefully, Ros. If he knows something we don't want him to hide – he might be our most substantial lead yet," warned Lucas.

"Or it's another lie." It was the first time Zaf had spoken since he and Lucas had arrived back at the Grid.

"Either way, it won't hurt to try and figure out his involvement with Trevor but also the agenda behind their meeting with Rupert at the Embassy," Lucas explained. Zaf didn't respond.

"Harry, we need to go to Istanbul," Ros said simply.

"No," he said loudly.

"It's the only way to put an end to this," Ros told him.

"It's a very good way to get yourselves killed!" Harry exclaimed.

"Harry." Ros leant forward, lacing her fingers in front of her on the table. "We can't let this go on. How long do you think it'll be before Fahir Akbulut and Kerem Polat try to pull something else? And next time, there might be a real bomb with deaths and trauma and Robert Camden banging down the doors of Thames House."

"Ros, I understand why you want to do this-"

"It's an entirely operational decision." Her lie was smooth but Lucas knew she was trying to sort this mess out for Zaf's sake - however, unknown to Lucas, Harry also believed that Ros was trying to right her wrongs from her ordeal with Yalta.

"It's risky," Harry grumbled.

"Adam would say it's doable." Zaf had spoken softly but every ear caught his words.

"That's exactly what he would have said," murmured Ros. "You know it, Harry. If we get this right, it's a big break. Ruthlessly remedying a load of rogues trying to take us down – plaster that in the newspapers and anti-Five fanatics will be silenced for weeks."

Harry sighed.

"No sight-seeing, and I want you all back here alive by next week."

He rose, pacing back to his office - Lucas, Erin and Dimitri also returned to their work stations but Ros lingered for a second in the Meeting Room to talk to Zaf.

"Well, at least we'll get another round of duty-free goodies," she tried, but watched how it took a lot of effort for Zaf to twitch the corner of his mouth into a smile that didn't even begin to meet his eyes.

"Zaf, do you want to do this?"

"Yes," he said, and then tried clearing his throat. "But I don't know if I'll be able to face it."

"No one would think any less of you if you stayed here," she told him. "Heading up surveillance and reports is still a decent step after what you've been through."

"But it wouldn't feel like a step in the right direction," Zaf replied. "I'll never be able to put this behind me unless I face up to it. But I'm scared to. Screw that, I'm terrified, Ros." He shrunk back into his chair and lowered his eyes.

Ros had always liked Zaf's honesty but his words were painful to hear, especially as it was something so harrowing to hear that she would never have imagined it coming from his lips.

"You're not by yourself. Lucas is one of the best, and we'll have the team here. And I'll even store away my wit for a little while to be entirely focussed on the op."

At that, Zaf allowed a tiny smile but Ros could tell he still wasn't entirely convinced.

"You're right – you should do this. It will help, but it doesn't mean it won't hurt."

"How do I deal with it, then?" Zaf asked desperately.

Ros spoke before she could stop herself. "By doing something extraordinary for those extraordinary people who no longer can. When Adam died, I went to pieces. More than I was ever willing to show. But, Harry gave me Section D and every day the only thing making me turn up for work each morning was because it's what he would have wanted."

She stopped because Zaf was looking at her from under his eyelashes and she instantly regretted having said so much.

"I don't want that to burden you, though," Ros said efficiently. "You do this if you can - and I have every confidence that _you can_ do this, Zaf."

"I've never heard you speak like that," he said softly.

"That's because I still need to come into work each day. To stop Fahir, and the next, and the next, for as long as I'm still breathing. If our focus drifts from what we do, we can't do it anymore."

"I can't just bury it though, Ros. Nothing feels the same anymore and I can pretend and joke around, but when I go home I don't get to watch telly with Jo or go to the pub with Adam. I'm still waiting for it to happen and the thought of never seeing them again-" His voice had become hoarse and Ros watched Zaf squeeze his eyes close briefly, hauling in some air and shaking it back out.

Ros couldn't stand tears. But more so, she couldn't stand them from people she cared about. No one would believe it, but their hurt caused her to hurt too.

All she could think to do was to reach out and squeeze his hand.

"Let's go to Istanbul, Zaf. Let's do this for them."


	36. Chapter 36

"You're free to go home now."

Lucas watched Ayla drag her gaze, the colour of liquid dark chocolate, from the cold table to his face as she let out the breath she had been holding since his arrival in the interrogation suite. However, her features soon moved from relief into suspicion.

"Why are you letting me go?"

"Well, you're going back to Istanbul but we'll be going with you," Lucas elaborated, taking a seat opposite her. "You bugged my jacket with a device so advanced that our technical bloke thought that Christmas had come early. Did you really think we wouldn't have any questions for you?"

Ayla blinked a couple of times and unclenched her jaw. "I was only doing what I was told to."

"By your husband?" asked Lucas.

"I didn't want to," she tried.

"By your husband?" Lucas repeated.

"Yes! My husband is very manipulative, as I'm sure you have discovered. He made me bug the jacket and he made me give myself up to you to tell you about the bomb. I had no choice," she said, suddenly sounding so tired.

"How do you think your sweet-faced innocence will play with the public when your terrorist husband strikes again?" asked Lucas coldly, leaning forward across the table.

"He controls me, Lucas. Everything about my life. My friends. My money. At first, I just did what he said because he paid me and it was easier not to ask awkward questions. But one day, I asked him where he worked and he smiled, took me by the hand and led me to that prison of his. And do you know who I saw?"

Lucas paused for a brief second before the painful truth dawned on him. "Zaf."

"Zaf," she confirmed. "Your officer. He looked so... I can't think of a word but it made me feel sick, and the man holding my hand was responsible. That's when I started asking questions, and that's when he realised that paying me wouldn't keep me on his side. He started to behave violently towards me as well as his prisoners."

"Why don't you leave him?" Lucas asked.

"I tried to, a year ago. He thought I had found another man. Do you know what he did?"

Lucas shook his head.

"He hunted down every man I ever dated and shot them dead. And then he told me he'd go for my friends next. And then my family."

Lucas watched the young woman return her eyes to the table top and couldn't help but pity her. From what they had experienced of Fahir so far, it didn't seem like an unlikely story and it was something they could always check. As for the woman herself, Lucas noted how she was struggling to meet his eyes and biting her lip nervously at having shared such a story.

"So, he made you work with him?" Lucas said, trying to understand. "Doing what? Deliveries? Meets?"

"Anything." Ayla sniffed and peeled her eyes from the table back to Lucas' face. "Collecting files from Kerem's surgery after hours. Doing surveillance on anyone he was suspicious of. He's incredibly paranoid."

"Do you know Kerem Polat well?"

"Very," began Ayla cautiously.

"What is it, Ayla?" Lucas coaxed.

"He's helping me leave Fahir. I went to him for stitches once after Fahir... hurt me." Ayla took a few seconds to gather some air and blink back a tear or two. "He said that my injuries and Fahir's DNA coupled with my confession and the deaths of my previous boyfriends would be enough to potentially convict him."

"So, you two were working against Fahir?" Lucas asked.

"Fahir never knew. But Kerem and Fahir believe the same things and Kerem agreed that he would complete the mission with him first, before - what's the expression you say? Stabbing him in the back."

"What things do they believe?"

"Kerem doesn't like the security services. His son got hurt in an operation – I don't know the details but he wants revenge."

"Against the entire service?" he pushed. She nodded.

"What about Fahir?"

"I'm not so sure. Kerem is very rich and he pays Fahir to help him."

Lucas sat back in his chair and rubbed a hand across his face. "Did you ever meet anyone else that Fahir worked with?"

"No. Only Fahir and Kerem."

"Ayla, listen to me. We can make sure that Fahir spends the rest of his life in a cell but we need you to help us."

"I will," she insisted.

"So tell me one last thing. Why did you tell us the bomb was for Oxford Street?"

A look of confusion crossed her face. "Because Fahir told me to. I didn't understand why he would want me to tell you where it was, though. Why give away its location if his intention was for it to go off?"

"There was no bomb at Oxford Street," Lucas said gently, fixing his eyes on her face to note her reaction. Surprisingly, her eyes widened and her mouth opened slightly in shock.

"It wasn't real?" Ayla asked in disbelief.

"No," said Lucas carefully, watching her breathe out and visibly relax.

"Lucas, please help me. Please sort this out. I'm afraid – I don't know what they might do next."

Lucas watched her face for a few more seconds before rising. "I'll be back in an hour."

...

He believed her.

Ayla had heard him being referred to as Lucas on the plane and so he couldn't use a pseudonym, and when she called him Lucas and asked for help it felt like a very sincere request. Her terror at talking about Fahir coupled with her relief at the news that the bomb was a fake seemed genuine. Lucas had also dug deeper with her file and found three men whom she had previously dated who had died under 'suspicious circumstances'.

Fahir had been deceiving Ayla. Telling her to tell them that there was a bomb, but not mentioning to her that it was all a smokescreen. She really was in the dark about his plot as much as they were, but her knowledge of Fahir and Dr Polat was indispensable to the team right now.

Harry had ordered Ros to bring Fahir in, but when he booked a flight back to Istanbul Harry abandoned his original plan thanks to Ros' reckless but doable suggestion of taking Fahir, Dr Polat and potentially the mole out in one swipe. It also seemed more of an attainable mission now that Ayla had informed Lucas that Dr Polat was about to turn against Fahir – tensions in their cosy little team would make them easier to target.

When Lucas told Ros to book an extra ticket for the flight, she didn't need to ask who the spare seat was for, just raising an eyebrow and saying: "Double date then – goody."


	37. Chapter 37

It was just after one in the morning when they collapsed onto the saggy seats of the train that was almost empty. The flight had been delayed by two hours and upon arrival in Istanbul it had taken a further hour to locate a taxi in order to get to the station, and then the train was delayed by 45 minutes - it had been the journey from hell and all four of them were shattered.

Ros selected a seat quickly, her heels clicking across the floor, throwing her handbag on the one next to hers to dissuade someone from sitting there before loading her suitcase onto the metal rails above. Zaf claimed a seat that faced in the direction that the train was going (he was already feeling a tang of nausea thanks to the pitiful plane food and didn't want to encourage it) and pulled a hat down over his head, abandoning his bags in front of his feet and closing his eyes. Ayla was wary: she didn't particularly want to sit with any of them but if they encountered any danger she wanted Lucas as close as possible, so she finally sunk into the seat opposite his and ran her fingers through her hair, pulling a bronze compact mirror from her purse and re-applying lip balm. Lucas dug a packet of gum from his pocket and offered it around before checking his phone for the hundredth time in the hope of finding a signal.

The plan was going to be fast-moving: they had booked into a hotel about two miles away from Dr Polat's house and would wait for the arrival of back-up later today before moving in to intercept the fourth and final message and arrest him. Meanwhile, a separate team would head to Fahir's prison to hopefully find him and get medical attention to the prisoners inside. If Fahir was not there, the next day they would send out an alert to the airports and ferries to close off his route out of the country and then Malcolm on CCTV would hunt him down and send over his location. Finally, they would search the prison and Dr Polat's house for any signs of communication with the mole and if that found nothing then they would ask them very nicely who it was.

It sounded ideal and simple and that they'd all be sipping cocktails in the airport lounge in a couple of days waiting for a flight back to London, but Zaf knew that there were complications that could occur. Most prominently, Ayla could have been bluffing - if she was, she could send them in the wrong direction and give them false clues about Fahir and lead them to their deaths. However, she knew her life depended on gaining MI5's trust and Lucas had installed a rigorous back-up system to hopefully prevent any disturbances, so Zaf trusted her to an extent but still had his doubts. Also, the team were unaware of how much the mole knew – right now, they could be warning Fahir and Dr Polat that MI5 officers were on their way.

Zaf rested his head against the train window and squeezed his eyes shut but sleep wouldn't reach him - the journey had been exhausting but worries and flashbacks were pushing to the front of his mind. It wasn't just his own wellbeing that he was concerned for; he didn't want Ros or Lucas to end up getting hurt in this mess that had nothing to do with them. Also, Fahir and the rest had seemed so many steps ahead at every stage of this and Zaf was almost expecting something to go drastically wrong. He focused his gaze on the view from the window.

The moon jogged to keep up with the train that scraped through the cool, smoked air. A smattering of stars tingled in the dark blanket of sky. It was a beautiful sight but in the day there'd be the sounds and smells and sights of the town he'd tried to escape, and Zaf didn't know how well he would be able to handle the next few days.

The train wheezed to a stop at the station which was thankfully in walking distance from their hotel. The MI5 budget wouldn't stretch to four different rooms so the boys and girls were bunking up – Ros was less than pleased at the prospect of sharing but more so at sharing with a terrorist's wife - she vowed to keep her distance from Ayla whenever possible and keep a gun in the top drawer next to her bed. Harry had issued firearms and shipped them over to a contact in Istanbul as to not raise alarm at the airport, but Zaf had shoved his to the bottom of his bag and intended not to use it. Lucas had got a strange sense of adrenaline at handling the weapon, although the last time he had held at gun it was pointed at Harry's head, the potential to ruin everything poised on his fingertips. This time, though, he had the chance to put it right, sort it out for Zaf, become equals with Ros, prove himself to Harry.

Maybe.

Either way, four people arrived in Istanbul but fewer than four would return to London.


	38. Chapter 38

**A/N: Many thanks to those who are still reading/reviewing after my inexcusably long absence from this story. I've been trying to figure out how to wrap things up before uploading more and I'm getting there slowly, but in the meantime I hope this slightly longer chapter is suitable consolation for sporadic updates.**

The cobbled ground clicked beneath his boots as Lucas led the way through the winding streets. They had reached a more isolated segment of the town and so the road was clear with the exception of a cyclist or two, and the towering buildings on either side were silent. The sun was mainly hidden beneath layers of thinning cloud but the air was still quite thick and uncomfortable, making the walk feel longer and more strenuous than if a slight breeze was to grace their presence.

Ros had plucked a couple of plums from a basket and pressed some coins into the palm of the street seller a while ago on their walk and was passing them around, the skin of the fruit saggy but the taste refreshing nonetheless in the face of the long walk they had been conquering. Transport was tricky and could attract attention that they didn't want and so it had been Ros' suggestion to walk to Dr Polat's, but the length of the journey was taking its toll on even her so no-one refused when Lucas suggested a pause. A splintery wooden bench sat between two potted shrubs that snaked into the air and offered a welcome seat to rest weary legs. According to their crumpling map and Lucas' memory of having travelled to the house, they were getting closer and would probably reach Dr Polat and the fourth message within the hour.

Lucas cast an eye over his colleagues and Ayla and deduced that despite their weariness they all held a coiled energy for what was about to happen. Ros' expression was ever calm and authoritative but her jaw was set and her movements agile; Zaf's eyes were hard and he hadn't offered a single joke along the way which proved his focussed intent; Ayla was the most apprehensive but possessed a magnetic curiosity about the events she had been thrown into. Most passersby that they encountered might have been suspicious of such a combination of sorts but nonetheless the four of them managed to weave through the streets efficiently and without incident.

"What happens when we get there?" Zaf asked again.

"I told you less than an hour ago," Ros said, tired enough not to summon a cynical edge to her response.

"The guards won't be a problem because they're on our side," Lucas started. After they had left for Istanbul Erin and Dimitri had been researching non-stop for any potential barriers to their mission, one of which being the 24/7 guards that Dr Polat had stationed outside his house. Fortunately, thanks to Harry's dazzling phone skills, the two men were persuaded to stay on duty but let in any MI5 officers that may approach – the fact that Lucas was already a familiar face at the residence would be a further incentive to letting them in without a fuss.

"Then we'll have a chat with Dr Polat and find out about this picture with the message," he continued, "before arresting him for further questioning if we so wish."

"How do we have the authority to do all of that?" Zaf questioned.

"Harry pulled some strings," Ros offered vaguely.

"We've got a back-up team in place ready on my signal if we need them," Lucas concluded, stretching out his legs and getting to his feet, eager to unravel what exactly they were up against.

The remainder of the journey was spent in silence and Lucas for one was glad of it as it allowed him to gather his own thoughts. He felt like the most ready member of the team for this operation – even Ros was a little off her game and Lucas was curious as to why – but this confidence came coupled with the potential of making grave errors. One false move would kill Lucas' career and his very soul at having got it so drastically wrong again. He tried to swat away these self-centred feelings, wanting to sort this for Zaf, but he couldn't help but fear for himself if this didn't go to plan. Ayla was also setting his teeth on edge – he was unable to tell if she was genuinely a frightened, exploited young woman or the best double bluff he'd encountered in years. Ros had been the one to share the hotel room with her and hadn't reported anything suspicious but that didn't mean that Ayla wasn't up to something, and this trip to Dr Polat's could be a part of her plan. After all, her husband was his ally...

Lucas showed his ID card swiftly to a guard and smiled as the gates were heaved open, leading up to the gravelly path of Dr Polat's front door. Lucas hadn't paid much attention to the front of the house on his last visit here, instead trying to pull Zaf inside and locate the source of the blood pooling onto the ground. He glanced over at him now to see if he had any recollection of the trauma, but Zaf was looking at this part of the residence with fresh eyes and evident anxiety.

Lucas knocked on the door firmly but there was no response.  
"Dr Polat?" he called.

"He could be in the garden," Ayla suggested. "Would you like me to go and check?"

"I will," said Ros quickly, heading off in the direction that Ayla gestured to. Lucas was glad of Ros' suggestion as letting Ayla do whatever she wanted out of sight was the last thing he was going to let happen.

"We're gonna have to break down the door," Lucas murmured.

"Why, when we can just use a key?" commented Zaf, holding up the little metal shard that he'd plucked from the flower pot with a smirk.

Lucas allowed himself a chuckle. "I love amateurish home-owners."

The door creaked a little upon opening into the empty hallway. There was still the immaculate interior that Lucas had remembered but no warmth or the scent of hearty cooking or the sound of footsteps on the wooden floor. For a second he wondered if Dr Polat wasn't even home, but the agent that Harry had stationed in Istanbul after Steven Bennett's murder had been keeping an eye on Dr Polat as well as Fahir and reported that he only ever left for work and that he wouldn't be going anywhere on a Sunday.

"Dr Polat?" Lucas called again, pushing open the door of the lounge.

Zaf ventured a comment: "It looks exactly the same as I remember it."

"It does," Lucas replied.

"Why don't you just get the picture and go? Ayla asked sharply.

"We need to find out what he knows," Zaf replied. "Where's the picture, Lucas?"

"Just here..." Lucas prised back the photos on top but his fingers were met with the rough wallpaper.

"Lucas?" Zaf said.

"The picture isn't here," he said darkly, but there was a rather prominent distraction. Lucas sniffed the air again, the unmistakable scent of heavy smoke filling his nostrils.

"Is that-" Ayla started, at the same time as Lucas murmured "Ros," and headed to the back door.

Dr Polat's garden consisted of a huge lawn with a border of flowers and fruit trees – it was well-kept and beautiful. Today, however, it had a new and rather dangerous decoration.

Lucas spied Ros and promptly headed in her direction, Zaf and Ayla behind him. "The picture isn't here," he said.

"So not only have we got a missing snap, but we've got a back garden bonfire," Ros replied smoothly, watching the smoke spiral lazily into the early afternoon air, the fire itself choking and spluttering as Dr Polat loaded more bits and pieces into the flames.

"What the hell is he doing?" Zaf asked no-one in particular.

"Probably burning all evidence of his involvement with my husband," Ayla suggested, crossing her arms.

"He looks different though," muttered Lucas. "Looks more free... but crazy."

The elderly doctor's attention was so focussed on the fire that his eyes hadn't glimpsed the four visitors, and he seemed to be muttering to himself. There was a large blade wedged in a chunk of wood beside the fire from which he occasionally hacked more kindling.

"I'll go," Ros volunteered, already taking a step forward.

"Who are you?" Dr Polat had noticed her presence as Ros appeared by his side slowly.

"A friend," she said. "Might I ask what you're doing?"

"I'm burning everything that used to belong to my son," he said simply.

They were both within earshot and Lucas' forehead furrowed at the response. Ayla had mentioned that his son had been hurt in an operation, but why erase any proof of his existence?

"Why are you doing that?" Ros asked.

"Because he's dead and I ruined his memory," Dr Polat sighed into the flames before moving his eyes her way. "Would you like to hear the story?"

If Ros was surprised at his keenness to tell all she didn't show it. "Go on."

"My son was a studious young boy, heading home from the library one evening with an armful of books. The place that we live in is very nice-" Dr Polat gestured to his magnificent house- "and I was never concerned for his safety before. Until that night, when a car comes barrelling down the road and knocks him to the ground. A second car approaches. Help for my injured son? No it was not. It was a bunch of security officers who were chasing the man who had knocked him down. They didn't stop the car to get him to safety. I bet they didn't even cast their busy eyes his way."

"Do you know who was driving?"

"Some terrorist or criminal who was trying to get away with no regard to the speed limits."

"And the officers?"

"I never got to meet the men who left my son for dead, no. I am a doctor - I knew when I was summoned to the scene that had my son received medical attention faster, he would still be alive. And there's more."

"What?"

"I'm well known. Respected. If it had got out that the security services left my son to die there would have been a scandal. So they covered everything up. The story was that they tried to save my son but he tragically died."

"Why did you agree to it?"

"They didn't give me any choice!" he roared, reaching for the blade. Ros flinched and stood ready to defend herself but he swung at the chunk of wood next to the fire and threw another piece into the flames. "They pretend that you can choose but they held guns and forced money into my hand and disappeared. And the only person who understood me was Fahir."

"So, you're trying to take down the service for what? Revenge? A memorial for him?" Ros was met with silence and despite his obvious upset at having shared his story she persisted: "I'm trying to understand, Kerem. Help me understand why you've been involved with Fahir."

"He understands me," Dr Polat snapped. "He wants to help me get justice for my son's unnecessary death."

"Fahir's a torturer and a killer; you're a doctor who saves lives," Ros said. "Fahir used you, Kerem. He preyed on your vulnerability and grief after your son got hurt. He manipulated you into thinking that we're the enemy, but that's just another lie. We can help you get out of this. All you have to do, right now, is walk towards me."

"I don't know who you are."

"My name is Ros. Please walk towards me." Her tone was one of someone trying to approach a wounded animal - so gentle and so convincing.

"I assume you're here to lock me up or kill me or whatever it is that you lot do?"

"Not at all. We've just got a couple of questions," Ros reassured him. "Firstly, we'd like to know where that sunset photograph is and what the fourth message was."

He didn't reply.

"What's the fourth message?" Ros tried again, losing her patience rapidly.

"It's gone now," he said, gesturing to the depths of the fire. "I burnt the picture. So, I'm free from this now."

"What was it?" Ros hissed.

He pulled his eyes from the flames to meet her face.

"Your friend is going to die."

...

"Crazy," Lucas concluded, watching Dr Polat being led to the back-up van.

"Not crazy," Ayla murmured. "Grief-stricken."

"Same thing," Zaf muttered to the ground. "We really just came here for him to tell us that one of us is going to die?" He gestured to himself and Lucas.

"That's what he said," Ros shrugged. "He said 'your friend'. I assume that's not me, and seeing as Ayla and I aren't best buddies that just leaves you two." She had spoken within earshot of the young woman and Ayla raised an eyebrow.

"So for all this time they've just been plotting to kill us?" Zaf asked, but no-one could offer an answer. "And this whole message thing was just to throw us off?" He turned to Ayla. "What do you know about the messages?"

"Nothing," she said smoothly. "I just knew that they were happening."

Lucas noted Zaf's distress and Ayla's confusion and Ros' impatience and decided it was time to make a move. "We've got Dr Polat. He'll tell us what we need to know – now let's get Fahir."

Lucas reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone, speed-dialling the leader of the back-up team. Frowning at the lack of response he re-dialled, checking to see if there was a lack of signal or if he'd run out of credit.

"What is it?" Ros asked, a tad worriedly.

"Back-up not picking up," Lucas murmured, attempting to keep his unease at bay and calling again.

"Lucas! Get out, go-" A thud interrupted the terrified voice of Daniel Hunter, Lucas' hand-picked leader of their back-up who was renowned for his toughness.

"Daniel, what is it?" Lucas asked loudly whilst flicking the phone on loudspeaker, his eyes locking with Ros'. "Daniel!"

"Run, little spies," hissed a new voice. "Better start running!"

"Who's this?" Lucas demanded, but the prolonged and irritating shrill tone told that answers were out of reach.

"We've been compromised," Lucas said hurriedly.

"We need to get out of here, now," said Zaf.

The unmistakable sound of a bullet being clicked into place sounded behind them.

"And where would be the fun in that?"


	39. Chapter 39

It wasn't a sensation that he was unused to, being prodded in the back of the head or between the shoulder blades with a gun. In fact, something about the adrenaline that the physical pressure provided was so familiar that the bundle of hideous flashbacks crawling through his head began to dissipate slightly. He was with his colleagues in a dangerous situation – they were all trained for stuff like this.

They had been blindfolded in the car, although mercifully they weren't crammed in the boot as the vehicle clearly wasn't big enough. It was shoddy though on the part of their captors – Zaf had a good look at the number plate before being bundled in and he knew the others would have clocked it as well. Besides from the fact that the four men had remembered to cover their own faces with masks and scarves, they seemed utterly disorganised. Good. That would mean they could be easy to overcome.

Then again, maybe they were just the foot soldiers. Their paymaster could be waiting for the car to pull up at his drive, with success and the taste of blood within his reach.

Despite the lesser physical pain than his previous experience of capture in that he hadn't just been shot, being stuck in a vehicle with no idea of the destination and blinded by a rough strip of material felt all too familiar and Zaf only realised that his eyes were damp and his breathing ragged when Lucas said, "Zaf, it's going to be fine." Remembering that he was in fact with two colleagues and a civilian at least eliminated the crushing sense of loneliness from his current anxiety soundtrack, although fear of the unknown and the slight sting of a circle where someone had prodded the gun into his back for not moving fast enough were still reminders enough of his previous experience as well as this new one that he had been thrown into.

Zaf thought about the mission in order to drag his mind from the despair that was digging its claws into his brain. How compromised were they, exactly? One back-up team had been found, but one had been successfully summoned to take Dr Polat away.

Dr Polat. Had he been part of their sudden capture, or was he really the grief-stricken man he said he was? And the man on the end of the phone of the compromised officer, Daniel, had a voice that sounded familiar – maybe it was Zaf's desperation that convinced him so but he was unable to shake the feeling that he knew who had spoken but couldn't quite hold onto the memory.

Zaf thought of Daniel Hunter, the man he'd met a couple of times on various ops and who he knew had three children. Then he thought of the sound of a fist connecting with Daniel's face and the silence that followed, and Zaf didn't want to think anymore.

The car shuddered to a halt around twenty minutes after setting off (Zaf had been counting the seconds instinctively) and they were pulled outside. Not being able to see anything was frustrating and the plastic binds pinning his hands behind his back made removing the blindfold out of the question, but Zaf had learnt to rely more on his other senses in these circumstances. The ground beneath his feet was solid, and by dragging his foot out in front of him he could feel lines separating the ground into squares: paving slabs. The toe of his shoe nudged a weed or two. He could hear Ros breathing behind him and a couple of orders being barked in Turkish; the car doors being slammed shut. Zaf felt the faint warmth of the Sun on his face and the tingle of a breeze. Somewhere close by, the scent of several spices was wafting.

"Move," someone barked roughly, prodding Zaf forward into walking.

Walking: he could do that. Zaf moved one foot forward and then the other, breathing in with one step and out with the next. A couple of steps later and he could add another jigsaw piece to the puzzle of figuring out where he was – there was the sound of running water.

A crushing sense of sudden realisation left only one option in Zaf's head.

"Stop him!" someone yelled, but Zaf slammed his feet on the ground faster than he thought he ever had and swore that no-one would stop him escaping this place again.

A pair of arms around his waist as strong as a vice suggested otherwise, as did the dizzying punch he received to the side of his head that forced him to the ground.

"Zaf!" Ros called out, her voice a little hoarse and with an unexpected note of panic.

"Get up," someone spat.

Zaf felt the cracks of the ground beneath his fingers, a bristly weed biting its tiny teeth into his knuckle. It had been barely two months ago that he had escaped, his frantic feet skimming this ground as he jumped into Lucas' car and sped away from his nightmare for what he hoped to be the rest of his life. But now, the fountain outside Fahir's prison was taunting him again, the sound of its water a source of torture when dehydration had made his body decay.

"Get up!" the voice yelled again, kicking him in the side.

"Zaf, it's alright," he heard Lucas say.

Zaf pushed his hands from the ground and clambered from his knees, managing to stand despite the tremors that had sabotaged his limbs.

"Move," someone said, manoeuvring him sharply back in the direction they had come. As he brushed past the others, Zaf felt a hand squeeze his briefly, the cool metal of a ring pressing against his fingers. Ros. The moment was quick as to not be detected but offered him a smudge of comfort. He cleared his throat and forced deep breaths through his nose and out of his cracked lips.

It didn't matter anymore that he was blindfolded: Zaf knew exactly where they were going.

...

"My first spy!" he exclaimed, breath hot and stinking on Zaf's face. They had been apart for just under two months but Fahir obviously hadn't discovered toothpaste in that time.

"And my second." The triumph in his voice couldn't be ignored and Zaf could picture the smug smile twisting Fahir's face into an ugly, rough canvas of dirty skin and yellowing teeth as he looked at Lucas.

"My third spy. She's _nice_." His tone was sleazy now, and threatening. Zaf heard a scuffle of material and then heard Ros say "If you don't remove your hand from my breast I'll knock your head against the wall so hard that your tiny brain will trickle from your ears." Had it come from anyone else the threat would sound void and overly-confident, but Zaf knew better than doubt Ros when she said something and also felt a pinch of sickness at Fahir's wandering hands on the body of his friend. This thought pushed a face to the forefront of his head without warning, a face he had prayed to see again in years of hopelessness and wished he had kissed long before the one time their lips had met when she dropped him off at the airport, ready for his flight to Tehran. The thought that she had been abused and raped and nearly killed by sadists like Fahir made Zaf's stomach clench so tightly that tears came to his eyes when he tried to force the bile back down his throat. Even when he managed to haul in some breaths, he could still picture Jo's face smiling at him as they chatted over mugs of coffee on their joint shifts or shared a takeaway after a hellish op, and the time she had fallen asleep on the sofa with her head in his lap and Zaf finally understood what it felt like to be looking at someone with so much adoration that any other emotion seemed to melt away as easily as a marshmallow above a flame.

"And last but certainly not least, my beautiful wife."

Fahir's voice pulled Zaf from his numb state of bittersweet reminiscing, and the sound of the slap put his mind firmly back to the present. Ayla was gasping and sobbing and even though they'd shared only snatches of conversation Zaf flinched on her behalf, feeling the sting where someone's knuckles had made an indent in his temple.

"You stupid, stupid girl. Did you think I wouldn't know that you and Kerem were plotting against me, you little whore?!" The blindfold was still tightly cinched over Zaf's eyes but the sounds of Fahir's fists connecting with Ayla's body told exactly what was happening, and Zaf was rather thankful to not have to see it happen.

"Fahir, please," she choked.

"You don't have to do this, Fahir," Lucas said solidly.

_Shut up mate, just shut up_ Zaf thought. It was disorientating and terrifying being stuck with the man who had tortured him and now held him again along with his colleagues and Zaf felt an overwhelming guilt at having got them dragged into this hell.

But even though Lucas had spoken out and got a punch for himself in return, Zaf knew that Ayla was the one in trouble now.

"_What will happen to me, if Fahir finds out I am working with you people?" Ayla asked in a hurried whisper, glancing over her shoulder. They had just clambered off the train in Istanbul and Ros was hunting down a taxi whilst Lucas had popped into a tiny store for some supplies. _

"_We won't let him find out," Zaf replied briskly, rearranging his scarf around his neck and rubbing his hands together against the cold._

"_How do I know you won't tell him?" she asked, her voice suddenly lacking the cool and uninterested sneer that he was used to._

"_Well, I for one won't let him because of my experience of what he's like," said Zaf. "I wouldn't wish it on my worst enemy, and you're not our enemy, Ayla. We need you. Even Ros, but she'd die before admitting it." _

_Ayla nodded to herself, and then a small smile worked its way to her mouth. "Who is your worst enemy?"_

"_Dylan Roberts. He stole my middle school girlfriend." Zaf spoke sincerely but his childhood woe felt so incongruous amongst the current danger they were facing that it made him chuckle and Ayla soon followed. _

"_What's so funny?" Lucas asked, plucking a piece of chewing gum from the new packet he had purchased before offering it around._

_Zaf raised his eyebrows an infinitesimal amount, challenging Ayla to share his little story. She reshaped her expression into one that was convincingly innocent and accepted a piece of gum._

"_Nothing."_

With every yelp of pain, Zaf could picture the confident, attractive young woman who had tried to make a life for herself being crushed into the ground and suddenly he couldn't have any regard for himself.

"Fahir, stop." He shifted his legs towards the source of Ayla's cries and Fahir's grunts as he unloaded another punch.

"Do you fancy her, Zaf? Is that it?" Fahir spat accusatively.

"Don't take this out on her. We made her work for us," Zaf lied as smoothly as he was able despite the panic churning in his head.

"No. She would never do this just for your pay. She would have to believe in something herself in order to act. She's stubborn." With the last word, Fahir moved again and Ayla cried out, but more quietly than she had done before. Zaf hadn't a clue how badly she had been beaten but the thought sent a chill down his spine that forced more words from his mouth.

"We threatened you unless she worked for us," Zaf tried. "We used her love for you to make her our weapon. She did this to protect you."

Fahir's breathing became even, balanced out after the exertion of littering his wife with punches. Zaf sensed him moving closer and then felt the breath on his face.

"For me?" Fahir asked, and for the first time his voice was soft.

"Yes," said Zaf, his voice smooth and even, a glossy coat over the lie.

Then he was doubled over in pain, the punch to his stomach ripping the breath from his throat.

"Bullshit," Fahir spat. "I know my own wife. I know she doesn't love me, and I don't her. She's always been here to be used, be it by me or you. We've treated her the same way, Zaf."

"I'm not the one who just punched her to the ground," Zaf managed to gasp.

"Always been a bit of a smart mouth, you have. A knight in shining armour. Well, watch this."

Gloved hands were pulling the blindfold from Zaf's eyes and suddenly he was glancing around the room, taking in the brick walls and floor and the lone lightbulb swinging from the ceiling, Ros and Lucas blindfolded with a guard each behind their back, the only door with two men blocking the way, Ayla splayed out on the floor with limbs speckled with blood and sweat and Fahir's face in front of his.

"Watch what?" Zaf somehow summoned the courage to ask.

At that moment, he noticed a familiar blade propped up in the corner of the room and Fahir making his way towards it.

"What's going on?" Ayla murmured from the ground, blood leaking from her lips.

"Ayla, look at me," Zaf commanded. "Ayla!"

"What's happening?" she asked, obviously panicking.

"Fahir, don't!" Zaf shouted; ready to throw himself in front of Ayla but two men much stronger than him were holding him back.

"What are you doing, Fahir?" Lucas shouted.

"You stabbed me in the back-" Fahir hissed.

"Zaf!" Ayla screamed, trying to push herself off the ground but the recent pain of her beating didn't allow her to move.

"Zaf, what's happening?" Ros hissed.

"and now, you'll get exactly the same-"

"Ayla, look at me!" Zaf ordered.

Her brown eyed gaze bore into his.

Zaf only had the chance to mouth _I'm sorry_ before Fahir lifted up the blade and brought it back down again, squeezing his eyes shut just before the impact but not before he'd seen Ayla's wide-eyed stare riddled with terror and tears.

"What's going on?" Lucas barked.

Zaf was the only one who could answer but his throat was dry and he couldn't stop the shaking that had gripped his body. His eyes were still tightly shut, his breathing trembling. He heard the clatter of metal against stone as Fahir presumably dropped the blade.

"What have you done, Fahir?" Lucas barked.

"You can all see now, I guess."

Zaf opened his eyes a tiny amount but didn't move them away from his feet, catching snatches of what was going on in his peripheral vision. Fahir tugged the blindfold from around Lucas' face and then Ros', grinning a little at their horrified expressions.

"If you betray me, I stab you in the back. Literally," Fahir said matter-of-factly, crouching down and smoothing his dead wife's hair from her face.

"You didn't have to kill her," Lucas croaked.

"I wouldn't have had to if she'd just done what I said but alas, women seem to have difficulty in following simple instructions," said Fahir, making his way back towards Zaf and telling one of the guards by the door to get rid of her.

"Why are you looking at your feet, Zaf?" Fahir asked softly. "Are you ashamed that you manipulated her? You're the reason she's dead, you know."

Zaf bit down on his tongue hard enough that the metallic taste of blood stung in his mouth, still keeping his eyes on the floor until Fahir grabbed his jaw and yanked his head in the direction of her body.

He peeled his eyes away from the gash in her back and desperately tried to focus on something else – he caught the movement of Ros' wrists moving against the plastic binds. Then he noticed that Ros wasn't wearing any rings.

It was Ayla who had grabbed his hand.

"Forgive me – I have been a poor host so far. Allow me to explain why you are all here today," said Fahir, his gaze sweeping slowly around the room like a predator sizing up its prey. Zaf shifted from foot to foot and glanced at his colleagues. Ros looked utterly cool if a little bored, juxtaposing with Lucas's evident discomfort at being in a prison-like environment. Zaf remembered how he had expressed understanding at his own experience of torture and wondered if Lucas had known someone like Fahir.

"When I was 18 years old, I came to your country. I found food, shelter, education. A new life from my childhood in Istanbul. I planted a bomb outside a top government building five years ago – that building was your MI5 headquarters."

Zaf already knew this having worked on the op but was curious about his motivation.

"But it didn't work. I tried to run but I noticed an officer tailing me, and he's in this room." Fahir prodded a finger into Zaf's shoulder. "Your spy, Zaf. I lost him, though. I've been running all of my life and you had no idea who I was so I escaped, fled back to Istanbul and started making a cover for myself. Employment. Wife. Most people think this is an abandoned building waiting for confirmation plans to be turned into a children's crèche, and my papers say that I am a cleaner and architect. But it's my place, my prison, where I destroy the weak willed and useless for not standing up for something in their lives and just bobbing along, accepting every shitty circumstance thrown their way."

Fahir's voice was rising but Zaf for once didn't feel afraid – he was suspicious. Fahir's voice, strangely, was lacking dips in intonation that would come with a passionate speech, making his words seem pre-rehearsed and perhaps not his own.

"Why did you try to set off the bomb?" Lucas asked.

"And then a stroke of luck came my way." Fahir was pacing the room now, eyeing them all critically and not bothering to answer Lucas' question. "A few friends of mine in Pakistan sent over a spy from the very same building that I had tried to bomb, and it was the very same spy who had been tailing me!"

"That's not a coincidence, it was planned," Ros said matter-of-factly.

"Of course. I have a friend who juggled a couple of operational details and organised for my tailer to become my torture practice."

_Operational details?_ Zaf knew that Fahir had to be talking about the mole.

"Who's your friend?" Lucas asked, obviously having clocked it as well, but Fahir smiled and shook his head.

"Not just yet. Where was I? Oh yes. Zaf. I'm sure you remember your little stay with me. You probably even recognised me from my bombing attempt. But you were so bloody _useless_ to me. No juicy government gossip to sell on for some money; no important operational details. In ten months you hardly gave me ten words. Well, unless you count the screams."

Zaf noticed Lucas trying to meet his eyes but he kept his gaze on his shoes.

"So, I was about to kill you when I met Kerem Polat."

Out of the corner of his eye, Zaf watched Ros shift uncomfortably, her fingers still straining to reach the plastic binds but in vain. Fahir was obviously far from finishing but she looked as equally confused as Zaf felt as to why he was telling them all of this... unless he knew it'd never leave this room.

Their fate would be the same as Ayla's unless they thought of a plan, and soon.

"Kerem wanted to take down the Service because his son was killed in a botched operation, although you already know that," Fahir said. "And he convinced me to keep Zaf alive so we could start a little mission of our own: the messages. And now, I shall get my friend to explain the rest."

Fahir gestured for the guard to unlock the heavy door. Zaf lifted his head in recognition and uttered the name of the mole.

"Hello again, Rupert."


	40. Chapter 40

**A/N: Many apologies for not updating this sooner – I hope you haven't forgotten what happened in the last chapter! This story is nearing its end now and I hope you enjoy some answers in this longer chapter. As always, if you have a second to review I'd really appreciate it.**

The name was familiar – yes, Rupert Moore. Lucas hadn't been directly involved in the Embassy op but knew that he had been absent from an important meeting and so Zaf had investigated him further. The man himself was wearing a hideous grin as he came to stand next to Fahir.

"How did you manage to get here undetected?" asked Zaf. "Our team back at Thames House are on constant airport watch."

"A certain truck route that runs from Istanbul to London and back again," Rupert replied coolly. "I just increased the email chatter so you'd think it'd be Fahir to use it but when he didn't you assumed you'd taken a wrong turn, when in fact it was my way in."

Zaf nodded. "Credit where credit's due, that was clever. As was your insistence of not knowing Fahir when I asked you in your pub, and it explains how you knew about my torture."

"You are a bright spark, Zaf," commented Rupert. "And there are usually so many imbeciles in Five. You three, however, are something different." He sniffed loudly, unpleasantly, and walked slowly to Lucas. "You've all survived death several times over. I think today it's time you stopped cheating fate."

Lucas felt his heart hammering but was determined to wear a bored expression. "What are these messages then?"

"All in good time," Rupert said in a sing-song tone. "Firstly, don't you want to know about how I've been running this? Well, I've had the operational experience from when I worked at Six."

"What?" Lucas asked, genuinely confused. Rupert would have been flagged as ex-Service when they ran routine checks.

"I don't work for you lot anymore, thankfully, but once you've learnt how to hack the MI5 and 6 mainframes it makes being a mole a piece of cake."

Zaf half-laughed. "So, the unsafe-safe house. Directions to Dr Polat's..." He tailed off, shaking his head.

"But we searched through your file," insisted Lucas. "You can't have worked for us."

Rupert laughed breezily. "Do you not think my IT abilities could stretch to erasing details on my own file? I walked amongst the shady spooks across the river at Vauxhall Cross for nearly two years until I was wrongfully sacked."

"No way." Ros had spoken. "There's no way you could cover something like a career in the Service up without outside help."

Rupert shrugged. "Maybe you underestimate me, Ros. I am rather good with technology. I managed to manipulate operational details so that Steven Bennett was sent out here to positively identify Zaf before I had him killed so he couldn't report back."

"You bastard."

"That, I am," Rupert replied easily to Zaf. "A clever one, but a bastard nonetheless, and you haven't heard the half of it yet. Allow me to take you back a few years to when I got sacked from the Service. It was a botched operation, and I was made to take the blame for it. The thought of all of you preening officers sipping coffee and flicking through files was enough to make me very angry indeed. So, I did something... risky. Risk is unavoidable in our line of work, I suppose," he smirked.

Lucas felt an overwhelming urge to correct him: Rupert was not one of them. However, he bit his tongue and raised his eyebrows, waiting for him to continue.

"I paid my good friend Fahir to set off a bomb outside Thames House."

"Why not Vauxhall Cross?" Ros interrupted.

"Their security is tighter. It didn't matter, as you're all part of the same corrupt system. But alas, it didn't work and Fahir had to vanish. But then young Zafar got abducted by the Redbacks... well, that was an opportunity I couldn't miss. I worked for them now and again after being sacked from your illustrious brotherhood and when I made the link between the failed bombing and the spy whom I now knew the whereabouts of, I realised that Fahir and I could work together again - he'd want suitable revenge on Zaf and I could use him for the messages. So, I paid the Redbacks a substantial sum to keep Zaf alive – you're welcome, by the way – and shipped him off to Pakistan. I then conveniently had a 'business conference' in Istanbul and tracked down Fahir, who was in contact with Kerem Polat. We bought Zaf from the group in Pakistan and began a little mission of our own, the part you're all dying to hear about: the messages."

Lucas had been listening intently to Rupert whilst simultaneously studying each corner of the room, willing to find some way to escape. The only way out was the one door that Fahir was standing in front of - the window was too small to get through and had steel bars blocking the potential route out. There were six guards in the room and undoubtedly more outside.

However, Lucas was staying relatively calm due to his rigorous back-up system. It was true that one of their back-up teams had been compromised but Lucas had been careful to install certain measures. For instance, his phone had a tracker and a device for him to send a coded message every hour to tell Dimitri and Erin back at Thames House that everything was going to plan – a missed message would mean danger and Special Forces would come and find them. Lucas couldn't be sure exactly how long they had been here but help would arrive at some point soon: for now, he had to sit tight and not get killed in the meantime. Lucas cracked his knuckles behind his back and wriggled his wrists again. He needed to break these binds...

"Sure, we could do a nice little street demonstration," continued Rupert. "Sure, we could set off a bomb. We could even kill an officer – but the service lives on, always will. But it shouldn't. We aimed to expose four of the key flaws of the Service one by one, targeted at junior officer Zafar Younis."

"But why me?" Zaf asked, his voice crumbling with hurt. "You could have targeted the Service in general."

"We needed a personal element. You lot are usually so bloody mechanical, so emotionless. But you've got feelings, however deep you've buried them. We needed to target those, the spy at their most vulnerable. Who better than a man who was abducted and tortured, with his beloved intelligence service doing nothing about it?"

"We did everything we could." Ros voice was strained. "We went further than official parameters to try and find him."

Lucas watched Ros' expression twist into a lethal combination of regret and someone desperately fighting to hold back tears.

"Don't you dare believe them, Zaf. We did everything we could to bring you home."

"I know, Ros," said Zaf soothingly. Lucas could only admire how carefully Zaf was handling the undoubted terror he was facing as he raised an eyebrow and said "You were saying?"

"The first message preyed on a very powerful emotion: guilt. Tell me, Zaf-" Rupert's voice had adopted the tone of a TV host interrogating a celebrity- "how did you feel when Steven Bennett was killed because of you?"

"He wasn't killed because of you," Ros muttered, but Rupert raised a finger to shush her and waited for Zaf's response.

"Guilty," said Zaf evenly.

"Correct answer," said Rupert smugly. "And so you should have. You three have been luckier than most, escaping death. But poor Steven? He got a bullet in his head and his wife will never know."

Lucas had never known the man but remembered when he and Zaf had gone round to his house to check for clues. He had been pre-occupied trying to download Steven's computer files but didn't miss the raw hurt on Zaf's face.

"Then I had a little word with Matthew Denham. He did quit the Service after getting himself into a moral quandary but then he made a convincing and satisfying new life for himself - did you seriously believe he'd throw it all away willingly? Then again, his A* in GCSE drama certainly did help with his acting skills."

"Why would an esteemed intelligence officer be working with someone like you?" Ros asked sweetly.

"Because I threatened to put a bullet in the head of each of his children if he didn't," Rupert said as easily as someone commenting on the weather. "We needed to throw a spanner in the works and Matthew Denham's apparently grief-induced suicide did just that. You were so busy fretting over his mental stability that you started to ignore other basic operational imperatives – such as, why Harry's surveillance officer of this prison hadn't sent in a report for over 48 hours. That's because that officer happens to be on my side, hence why they said you could head safely to Dr Polat's today and we could just pick you up."

"So what was this second message supposed to do?" Lucas questioned.

"A warning. Once you're in the Service, you can't leave. You can 'resign' but the memories and the instincts will stay with you until the sweet release of death."

"This is all a bit symbolic: and utter bollocks. Why not just kill?" demanded Ros.

"Well, that was the original aim. We had trouble getting the messages started so Fahir just ordered for you both to be killed at the first safe house. But once we got you to Dr Polat's we saw that you really trusted him, and so it was a relief that you were both alive and well to return to London."

Lucas frowned – that was one hell of a risk. Why hadn't they planned something so huge in more detail?

"Alive, hardly well," commented Zaf, moving his eyes to Fahir. "And then you start to manipulate your wife."

Fahir laughed, the sound harsh and barking. "Ayla was the perfect double agent because she didn't know she was one!" His tone was so triumphant that Lucas felt a bubbling anger, particularly as Rupert chuckled too. He must have caught Lucas' expression as he said, "And it helped seeing as you've got a poor reputation with women. Maya, wasn't it? Another person dead because of you lot."

Lucas clenched his teeth together and willed every fibre of his being not to react but Zaf was looking at him quizzically and even Ros looked mildly concerned.

"I like the next chapter. You were starting to get suspicious about your mole so I set up a meeting with Alastair Cooper and Trevor Harvey about some totally irrelevant and boring matter to make you suspicious as to why we weren't in Robert Camden's meeting. True, it was risky putting myself in there but I wanted to see what was going on. The thing is, that Trevor Harvey was in the wrong place at the wrong time and overheard a little conversation I was having that would expose me and so he had to be silenced. Then, I twiddled his phone records to make it seem as if Alastair Cooper had been calling him repeatedly so you'd get suspicious of him too."

A tiny detail clawed its way into Lucas' consciousness. "Camden's meeting was about a deal abroad, was it not?"

"Not a clue," said Rupert dismissively, but Lucas could spot a lie from half a mile and wondered why he wasn't disclosing this particular piece of information when in all other elements of this operation he was willing to tell all.

"And then we have the fake bomb," Fahir crowed, a smile crawling onto his lips.

"Yes, the fake bomb!" Rupert trilled as they shared a laugh. Lucas wanted nothing more in that moment for his knuckles to connect with their teeth and see if they'd be smiling then, but he bit the inside of his cheek hard and waited for them to elaborate.

"Your number one priority is the security of your beloved country, so a bomb threat in Oxford Street would of course be thoroughly investigated. I knew you'd be keeping an eye on me so we needed a suitable distraction in order for me to meet Fahir and arrange a few more bits and pieces before coming to Istanbul. By this time we were so far ahead that the third message, the numbers revealing Dr Polat's involvement, was a little gift from us to help you advance in your train-wreck of an operation."

"How thoughtful of you," Ros drawled.

"Ah yes, the numbers." Zaf made a show of moving his forearm the little that he could, wincing as the binds bit his wrists. "I carved them into my arm to remember them - time in that cell was ticking by quite slowly, so it gave me something to do. Kind of alarming what a man will go to when he's suffering unbearable torture, but I doubt you cared about that, did you?"

"Not particularly," snarled Fahir.

Lucas was frowning. Zaf had just been babbling seemingly for no reason, and he was usually pretty precise with his words. Lucas replayed his friend's string of sentences and the slightly exaggerated gesture with his arm and suddenly he realised something.

_Time. Ticking. Alarming._

Zaf hadn't been stealing words from a clock catalogue; he'd been giving a message of his own. As Lucas looked at Zaf's arms and the faint scar of the numbers, he noticed the watch buckled around his wrist.

The watch that was not only a watch, but a camera, tracker and recorder that Zaf had used on the Embassy op.

Lucas bit back a smile. "You've got to watch out for potential torturers in a job like this, Zaf," he said, with a barely noticeable emphasis on the word watch. Zaf looked at him and nodded – natural seeing as they had just talked out loud, but the subtext of their conversation being confirmed. Lucas knew about the watch but he didn't know when Zaf had activated it – how much had he already got recorded? He looked at the time and calculated that he had sent his last message to Thames House fifty three minutes ago – Special Forces would storm the building soon and save them.

Rupert's head suddenly jerked upwards: "How did you know about the numbers when you were being held?"

"I heard you lot discussing them," Zaf told him. "A code for your associates, I presume?"

"Yes," Rupert confirmed smugly.

"Maybe you assumed I was unconscious at the time, but it turned out to be quite a mistake on your behalf," Zaf replied.

Rupert barked a laugh. "You've hardly won, Zaf. You've been our puppet all along. It doesn't matter that we planned this quickly: it still ran like clockwork."

Lucas felt a frown nudge his forehead. They may have the upper hand at the moment but their whole plan seemed to be cobbled together with the common ground of a want for revenge, which would undoubtedly make their plans flawed and unlikely to succeed. He cleared that thought for the moment and listened intently to Rupert's next words, hunting for the glitch in their supposedly impregnable mission.

"Next, I went to meet Fahir at that cafe and handed him a fake detonator so you'd cut the network system and subsequently lose CCTV of us, giving enough time for us to chat and then leave. We knew you'd be adamant to pull Fahir by this point so we lured you to Istanbul, and here you are. I think that's everything, don't you?"

"I have a question," Ros drawled, waiting for every pair of eyes to move her way before speaking. "If you guys are all anti-service chums then why was Dr Polat trying to erase his involvement with you with a back garden bonfire today?"

"Dr Polat wasn't really one of the bad guys," Rupert told her. "We preyed on his anger and grief after his son's death and manifested him into a weapon for us. Again, I tinkered with some of his details and wove a story about how he was loyal to MI5 after officers tried to save his son, but as you know that wasn't the case. I knew about this before approaching him, though. I was sacked from the Service because I gave the order for the officers to chase the man who hit him."

"You indirectly caused the death of Dr Polat's son?" Zaf asked in disbelief.

"That, I did. Of course, he didn't know – we needed his full cooperation and for that his ignorance was necessary."

Lucas almost shook his head in disbelief - in all of his years of dealing with unsavoury characters he'd never come across such an unorganised and mistrusting bunch. It made him almost roll his eyes but he became distinctly aware that their lack of organisational skills could spell disaster for them: and victory for him. Lucas kept his breathing steady but allowed himself the luxury of contemplating success.

"But we'll get him now, for betraying us," chipped in Fahir, scrubbing a hand across the speckles of stubble on his jaw as he spoke. "I knew that he and Ayla were plotting against me, about to turn me in to the police for my violence. I wasn't about to get caught for it."

"Get him?" Ros asked.

"Yeah," said Fahir, cracking his knuckles. "But first we'll deal with you."

"Message four," said Rupert darkly. "You'll always end up getting killed when you work for the Service, and they won't even care. You're resources, all of you. Replaceable." He grinned as Fahir moved towards Ros.

"I wouldn't do that if I were you," Lucas started instinctively, moving his eyes to Ros protectively even though she looked utterly unfazed.

"And why not?" Fahir pressed the gun to Ros' temple and Lucas watched as she bit down on her lip; the movement subtle but not unnoticed by him.

"Here's the thing about us spies – we're overly paranoid. Do you not think for a mission carrying this much risk we would install a plan B?"

"You've got no plan B," said Rupert smugly, but his fists clenched.

Lucas could feel Ros' gaze boring into him, telling him not to provoke them into killing before the back up team could arrive. He let his eyes flicker to Zaf's watch: two minutes.

Two minutes of bluffing: easy. Lucas had spent the last twenty years living a lie.

"Officially, no," he sighed, allowing a little faked despair creep into his tone. "Well, seeing as we're dead, why don't you tell us who you've been working for?"

"Working with, not for," Rupert corrected, his eyes hard.

"Working _with_; my mistake," said Lucas softly. "You two made quite a team, I must admit. Luring three MI5 officers. You've certainly triumphed."

Zaf met his eyes briefly in acknowledgement of what Lucas was trying to do and he chipped in.

"Go on, Rupert, you've won," Zaf cajoled. "Come on; grant a dead man's wish. I'm curious now. You went to meet someone at your pub on the night we met. Who was it?"

A smirk played with the corners of Rupert's mouth as he contemplated his victory and then shrugged. "You won't like the answer."

Lucas chuckled softly. "We kind of get used to bad news in this profession, don't we?"

Rupert nodded. "Your lady friend was right." He gestured to Ros. "A higher authority did help the mission go a little more smoothly. You nearly caught me red-handed that night, Zaf, but I was clever enough to crawl out of it."

_Hell, he's arrogant, _Lucas thought._ Still, better butter him up to find out who this other traitor is._ "You were smart enough to escape though, you and your contact. What's their name?"

Rupert grinned. "Thames House's very good friend, Robert Camden."

"The foreign secretary is on your side?" Ros spat. Lucas couldn't blame her for her tone – she'd had troubles with secretaries, being almost killed by one home sec whilst trying to save another – and he too was facing an immeasurable amount of disbelief at Camden's audacious betrayal. However, this feeling soon dissipated and left Lucas with sheer joy at the thought of taking that bastard down. Then he caught the movement of Fahir flicking his gun from hand to hand and remembered that things could still go drastically seconds before their rescue.

"Robert had the easiest access to all those goodies at Thames House, like the bugged jacket that Ayla gave you," Rupert told Lucas. "He even nabbed a nifty voice alteration programme in case anyone recognised my voice when I left some of the messages by phone."

"How didn't he get caught?" Lucas asked, genuinely curious.

"He was careful. And if anyone even suspected him, it would be ridiculous to accuse the Foreign Secretary of being a traitor and any such accusation would have been fiercely quashed."

Lucas knew, annoyingly, that Rupert was right. Robert Camden waltzed around like he was untouchable because he basically was, and that certainly explained why Harry never took a liking to him.

Lucas slid his eyes back to the watch – the hour was up. He lifted his eyes to Zaf and then to Ros.

Lucas flicked his foot round the ankle of the guard stationed behind him, sending him crashing to the ground before delivering a brutal kick to the kidneys - out of the corner of his eye he watched Zaf employ a similar technique effortlessly. The next sound Lucas heard was a bloodcurdling cry from the guard behind Ros and watched in disbelief as she pulled the brooch from the man's thigh and spun round, kicking him between the legs before delivering a punch to his stomach.

"So many people think that brooches are the most useless piece of jewellery, but they cut through plastic binds quite well," Ros commented breezily, pinning the bloodied badge onto her top and moving towards Fahir and Rupert.

"Alright, this can just be you and us." Zaf jerked his head towards Lucas. "You can let Ros go – she wasn't a part of this. Get rid of them while you're at it too." Zaf deftly kicked a guard attempting to crawl back up, sending his crashing back to the floor with a groan.

"No," Ros said firmly but Zaf shook his head. "She's got nothing to do with this. Please, Fahir, let her go."

Fahir moved the gun from hand to hand, caressing the weapon between gloved fingers as he contemplated.

"Leave," he decided, his eyes locking with Ros'.

"No," she countered.

"Ros, get out," Zaf commanded, turning his gaze to her.

She stared at him evenly for several seconds and then walked silently from the room. Lucas was glad that she was now out of harm's way but he was sure that two minutes had come and gone – so where the hell were Special Forces?

"Guard the outside of this door, and keep an eye on her," Fahir ordered the men sprawled on the floor. They nodded weakly and shifted out of the room.

"It looks like I've won," Fahir grinned. "Oh, I thought of so many ways to kill you over this last year, Zaf. But now I've realised what will cause you the most hurt – harming your friends. And so, I shall kill your friend here first so you can watch."

"I wouldn't do that if I were you," said Zaf quickly. Lucas felt his heart in his mouth and was thankful for Zaf's interruption but fearful for what it might mean for him.

"And why not?" asked Fahir.

"Keep us alive and you'll find out."

"He's bluffing," Rupert murmured to Fahir. "Shoot him now."

"I'd say that would be a very grave mistake," Zaf told him. Lucas recognised a new quality in his voice: confidence. He had talked often with Ros about Zaf and knew that he had once been a bundle of energy, a terrible flirt and a confident charmer. It seemed like Zaf had found his own voice again – but in a dangerous situation.

He was being brave to try and save Lucas. This should have filled him with relief, but a terrifying dread had begun to make its way into Lucas' mind.

"You see, we've got sophisticated gadgetry – you'd know that having stolen a lot of it," Zaf started. "So it will be very easy now for us to put you behind bars for the rest of your life because of that full and detailed confession you just gave."

Fahir's grip tightened on the gun nervously before his rage exploded.

"You've got no evidence!" he roared.

"Well," said Zaf, turning his back to them so they could see his bound wrists and running a thumb along the smooth screen on his watch. "I wouldn't underestimate our gadgetry if I were you."

"I'll still kill your friend," Fahir said insistently, pushing the gun back against Lucas' head.

"And then what? Another death for nothing, Fahir. All you've ever done is lie and manipulate and hurt. You're never going to win."

"Don't, Zaf," warned Lucas, all too aware of what his friend was trying to do.

"You haven't achieved anything. You've ruined a couple of lives, but you won't be remembered for it," spat Zaf.

"As long as our cause is remembered, we will have been successful," sneered Rupert. "The Service will have to change now."

Zaf had the audacity to laugh in his face. "What, because some arrogant little men whined about it?"

"Stop it," instructed Lucas, his tone harsher this time.

"Your pathetic attempt to take us down will be buried and forgotten. You've changed nothing and you never will. You don't mean anything, either of you!" shouted Zaf.

"Zaf!" yelled Lucas, reaching to push his friend down but Fahir's mind had already been made up, the gun pointed at Zaf's chest. The shudder and crack of the gunshot was deafening and Lucas froze on the spot as he watched Zaf crumple to the ground.

"Surrender your weapons! Put your hands where we can see them!" Special Forces were screaming but Fahir smacked the light switch, shrouding the room in darkness. Lucas dropped to the floor, shuffling into a corner in an attempt to avoid the crossfire. He was acutely aware of the shoving and grabbing and shouting and gunshots as he dragged himself to where his friend had last stood, the sharp tang of metal and blood stinging his nostrils.

"Zaf!" Lucas fumbled from his friend in the dark, and then another voice sounded, shrill and terrified. Ros navigated her way to Lucas, holding up a flashlight and kneeling down beside him. "Zaf," she screeched again, shaking his shoulders fiercely, willing him to move. Her hands searched his chest for the warmth of blood.

Lucas squeezed his eyes shut for a second, cursing every fibre of his being. Why hadn't he been the one to get killed? Zaf didn't deserve to die, Zaf-

Zaf rolled onto his side, carefully moving to his feet as the back-up lights snapped on. "Lucky they were blanks, huh?"

"You could have been killed!" spat Ros, reaching out in a way that Lucas honestly thought she was going to punch him. But then her arms were flung around his back as she hugged him tight enough that Zaf stumbled for footing a little. The gesture was brief and Ros broke away after a few seconds, but it had been a display of affection nonetheless. Zaf blinked a few times in confusion and watched as she walked away to negotiate with Special Forces.

"Why did you do that?" Lucas couldn't help but ask as someone cut the binds from his wrists.

"I watched a man much braver than I do it. He saved his fellow officer's life," Zaf replied.

"I reckon you're rather brave yourself," Lucas told him, finally allowing the relief at still being alive to wash over his face in a smile.

The body of Rupert Moore was strewn across the floor, littered with blood and bullets. It was probably inhuman to feel joy at the sight of a body, but Lucas was glad that Rupert hadn't made it out alive seeing as so many undeserving others suffered the same fate at his blood-covered hands.

Lucas headed to the pick-up vehicle outside and watched as Special Forces dragged Fahir away, swearing and straining against their strength. He had lost his purpose and must have known he'd be spending the duration of his life inside a cell. Would he wish to be in Rupert's place, cold and lifeless but free?

Lucas watched Fahir lift his eyes to his face, and the look he received was so loathing that Lucas instinctively tore his eyes away. But he had spotted something else – relief.

Maybe, even someone like Fahir was afraid of death.

...

"If you knew they were blanks, why did you fall to the floor?" Lucas asked as the three of them finally stole a few seconds alone in the hotel lift after having been evacuated from the prison, sent to the hospital for checks and finally driven back to their hotel in Istanbul, ready for the flight back to London tomorrow.

"I didn't know," said Zaf softly.

"You thought they were real?" asked Ros.

"Yeah," Zaf told her.

"Don't you ever risk your life for me, Zaf," said Ros in a tone so sharp that Lucas was shocked – not that Ros had spoken this way, but that her words were directed at Zaf. "I don't deserve to live instead of you." She moved out of the lift silently, her words still echoing in Lucas' ears.

It had been strange, really – out of all three of them, Zaf had never done one wrong against the Service and yet he was the first one to risk his own life for them. Ros' words had been deadly serious – she wasn't provoking a reaction to be reassured of her own worth – and Lucas felt cold at the thought of his friend's body on the floor while he was still wandering through life, trying to pick up the rest of the shattered pieces that he had caused over the years.

"Night." The two had walked the corridor journey of a few seconds in silence due to Lucas' pondering. Zaf had located his room number and smiled, leaving Lucas with the promise of seeing him back at the Grid tomorrow. The mere thought of returning to some form of normality was intoxicating and Lucas allowed a smile on his face at the thought of finally being accepted back into the team.

Unfortunately, that wasn't to be the case.


	41. Chapter 41

Zaf hadn't slept at all on the journey back to Thames House despite the overwhelming fatigue he was feeling. It was surreal that his ordeal spanning several years and the mess of these last few months finally had answers, and the thought of recovering and moving on felt for the first time within his reach. Much to his dismay, as soon as the plane's wheels had scraped the runway he was sent to Tring to pour out his raw emotions as Diane Jewell took hasty notes - the session was fortunately cut short because of his inability to stop yawning but Diane had shook his hand with a smile and Zaf wondered if for the first time he had passed the test of proving his mental stability.

When he arrived back on the Grid, pods swivelling in their irresistibly slick fashion, he received a manly hug from Dimitri and a surprisingly strong handshake from Erin. As much as Zaf was happy to see them again, he was anxious to find Lucas and Ros who were nowhere to be seen.

"Lucas went home to sleep," offered Dimitri, as if reading his mind, "and Ros disappeared to drink her weight in coffee, in her exact words."

Zaf smiled. "That sounds like her. And Harry?"

"Chatting with the Home Sec," said Erin, but her frown didn't go unnoticed.

"What is it?" Zaf pushed.

"He wants to see you, Lucas and Ros, and when he told me that he was wearing his most fearsome frown," Erin warned.

Zaf nodded but felt familiar nerves gripping his entire body. They'd come back alive, as per their boss' instructions.

But Ayla hadn't.

Lucas interrupted his musing as he came through the pods, smiling warmly at Erin and Dimitri before switching his eyes to Zaf.  
"Debrief?" he asked.

"Harry and Ros aren't here yet." Zaf stuffed his hands in his pockets and paced nervously to his desk, incredibly thankful when Malcolm appeared and plunked a steaming mug of tea on his desk.

"Malcolm, you're a lifesaver," Zaf declared.

Malcolm chuckled. "You're the real hero of the hour, so I hear. Talking Fahir out of shooting Lucas. It almost reminded me of-"

"Yeah." Zaf cut him short. "Danny."

"It feels like a lifetime ago," Malcolm pondered, perching on the edge of Zaf's desk. "And sometimes it feels like just yesterday."

Zaf let his mind flicker back to his first day on the Grid - flirting with Sam, convincing Harry to let him get a message to Adam and then watching in horror as one of their colleagues and friends, Danny Hunter, not even thirty, got shot in the head. He felt so out of place then, the stranger watching their grief and pretending to understand – but what he did understand was how incredibly brave Danny had been. Zaf vowed to himself on that very day to try and be brave if he were put in similar circumstances one day, because he needed to be and the Service needed him to be and the people on the streets who he fought to protect needed him to be.

"You're doing alright though, eh Malcolm?" Zaf broke the melancholy mood.

"Oh, I'm doing splendidly. It's good to have you back with us, Zaf." The older man was so sincere and his smile so familiar that Zaf felt sudden tears springing into his eyes, but mercifully his attention was drawn to the sound of Ros' heeled boots puncturing the floor followed by the heavy footsteps of their boss.

"Shall we?" Harry gestured to his office and Zaf took one last gulp of the tea before making his way to the inner sanctum.

...

"And where is Fahir now?" questioned Harry, looking as exhausted as Zaf felt. They had taken it in turns to contribute parts of the operation informally in order to update Harry before an inevitably hellish official report would be constructed in the near future. Malcolm had graciously offered to be tea-boy and had just brought in a fresh packet of biscuits before leaving them in peace as Harry continued his interrogation.

"Awaiting trial for a number of offenses, least of all torture and imprisonment of a number of people. Special Forces found eleven other prisoners and ensured that they received medical attention," Ros said confidently, shifting her gaze slightly to Zaf with a smile. Zaf nodded in return, knowing what she meant: Fahir was finally being brought to justice.

Zaf wondered if this felt like a worthy enough sentence, though. He'd toyed with the idea of Fahir's death, even wishing on certain dark occasions that he could be the one to end his life. It seemed so cruel that Fahir had lived when so many others had been hurt because of him, but the anger and pain at his experience was mercifully fading day after day and Zaf felt the wounds of his emotional trauma finally being stitched back up. He reached for a biscuit and waited for Harry's response.

"Hm," said Harry. "But he insisted he wasn't really anti-Service and just wanted the money that Kerem Polat was offering?"

"Yes," confirmed Ros. "And Rupert wasn't just a mole for convenience's sake – he was the driving force for the operation. Kerem Polat was acting out of grief and Fahir just wanted money."

"I'm not sure if I believe it. Why would he be that impressionable?" questioned Zaf. He felt the scorn in his voice to be justified – killing and torturing just for money was sickening, and Zaf had spent enough time on the receiving end to want to know how a human being can make the leap from morality to immorality on the basis of having a bit of a heavier wallet afterwards.

"I've been having a bit of a dig around Fahir's background and found some details about a rather unsavoury father. It seems 'violence is the answer' was the motto of the Akbulut household," commented Harry.

"All sorts of things can happen to make people act in strange ways." Lucas' voice cut through the office. "I'm not saying he wasn't bad - I'm not defending him for a second, Zaf - but he might not have always been this way. Impossible circumstances might have turned the world against him, and he did what he thought was right to change the odds back in his favour."

Zaf watched Harry's expression adjust to something of a hurt look at Lucas' words and wondered if he'd just been talking about Fahir.

"What about Kerem Polat?" Harry changed the subject quickly.

"They used him," replied Zaf. "He's given a full confession and another little piece in our puzzle. He insisted he showed Lucas the picture with the numbers whilst we were staying at his house because he wanted us to find out what was going on. He realised too late that he'd only been involved because he was still grieving for his son."

"Why did they choose the sunset picture to be a message, of all things?" Harry mused.

"One of Dr Polat's passions was photography. He studied it vigorously but decided to be a doctor as he thought it was better to help people," Zaf offered, watching the confused glance Lucas threw at him and adding "He talked to me a lot while we stayed there."

"How sweet – he gave up his lifelong dream to help people, and ends up cavorting with terrorists," Ros muttered.

"He wasn't one of them, Ros," Zaf told her insistently. He couldn't quite put his finger on what it was that convinced him so, other than when they discovered Dr Polat's involvement it just felt plain wrong. "The picture was perfect – simple, memorable and virtually untraceable. We spent hours running those numbers through our databases and found nothing."

Harry nodded to himself, digesting the information before finally asking the inevitable question. "How was Ayla killed?"

"Fahir." Lucas didn't hurry to add anything else and Zaf was glad not to have to hear it. Only now had they been able to realise that she too had been manipulated, forced into acting against her will, beaten and terrorised by her husband and desperate to try and get away before being senselessly murdered. She was another casualty of the service, another body behind the scenes buried in a forgotten plot that received no flowers.

"She was a civilian in the care of the security services," Harry murmured to himself, rubbing a hand across his forehead. "If the press get their hands on this-"

"Then don't let them," Ros cut across smoothly. "Our security was compromised, Harry-"

"And I'd very much like to have a word with whoever it was that stuck their noses into this operation," Harry spat, his phone beginning to ring before Ros could finish updating him.

"Yes... what?" Harry spat in disbelief. Zaf exchanged a glance with Ros.

"No, you can't... well I bloody well don't think that's in order," Harry snapped. "You do that." He slammed the phone down and his expression told that maybe this hadn't been the simple resolution they were hoping for.

"I've just had Robert's Camden's personal advisor on the phone," Harry started, leaning forward in his chair. "He's taking direct action against the Service for this train-wreck of an operation."

Zaf felt a tiny smile crawling onto his lips and saw that his colleagues had the same reaction to the news.

"Well, I'm glad you're all finding this amusing but we'll all be out of a job in the near future," Harry barked, awaiting an explanation.

"Who wants to tell?" asked Ros, an actual smile tickling her features.

"Tell me what?" Harry asked exasperatedly.

"I'll do it," Zaf grinned. "Harry, our mole was Rupert Moore but his partner in crime was our friend Mr Camden. We've got a taped confession."

"A taped confession?" Harry repeated in disbelief.

"Malcolm's wonder watch," said Lucas.

Harry leant backwards in his chair. Then, very slowly, a smile moved across his face, merging into the sunniest expression Zaf had even seen him wear.

"And he has no idea that we know?"

"Well, his little friend Rupert got killed in the crossfire so I very much doubt it," Ros said smoothly.

"I think it's time we paid Mr Camden a visit, don't you?"

...

"Hello Harry." Robert Camden's words were clipped and he ran a disapproving eye across the party piling into his office. "Oh good, you've brought the cavalry."

"Please, Robert, I'm sure we can sort something out." Harry's voice was filled with anxiety and it took every ounce of Zaf's self-control not to grin at his boss' outstanding acting abilities.

"I've just had a forensic report and it appears that the blade used to kill Ayla Akbulut is covered in Kerem Polat's fingerprints. Care to explain that?" Robert asked, sitting down on his chair and lacing his fingers in front of him on the desk.

Zaf replayed the memory in his head and suddenly something clicked.

"We saw Dr Polat using that blade to chop wood. Fahir was wearing gloves when he wielded it." Zaf suddenly became aware of what exactly Camden was trying to do and almost flinched. "You're setting Dr Polat up because he jumped ship from your failed mission."

"Mr Younis, I doubt that will hold up in court when I have clear evidence to link him to the murder," Camden replied matter-of-factly. Zaf flinched at the formality and it made his skin crawl at how unfair this was going to be if Camden got away with it.

"Robert, this is-"

"What, Harry? The truth? This operation which you wrongly sanctioned was a complete train wreck and you're all going to have to pay for it."

"Oh, come on," Zaf laughed, finally deciding to break the news. "We all know that you were Rupert Moore's partner in crime."

Zaf watched with satisfaction as the colour slowly drained from Camden's face, although he fought desperately to remain composed.

"I've got absolutely no clue what you're talking about," he practically squeaked, hastily pouring himself a glass of water.

"I went to a pub a couple of weeks ago. Rupert Moore has a share in it: it's your rendezvous. When Rupert saw that I was there he called your meeting off, which will be relatively easy to prove with our call logs."

Camden's face was getting paler and paler but Zaf wasn't even close to finishing yet.

"What's more, you helped him set up Alastair Cooper and Trevor Harvey. You organised a low-priority meeting for the three of them to make us suspicious as to why they weren't at the main meeting and then assisted Rupert in the murder of Trevor Harvey. Hell, we've even got CCTV footage of both of you leaving the Embassy one after another matching the time just after his death!"

"I didn't kill him," Camden growled.

"Assisting someone to commit murder, co-operating with terrorists – not really commendable for a Foreign Secretary, is it?" Zaf hissed.

"You were in Thames House several times fingering our gadgetry, so you would have come across Ros," added Harry. "You feigned surprise that there were officers in your meeting, but you knew all along and so you threw a spanner in the works, making something up about a Turkish business deal to throw us off the scent. There was no such deal happening."

Zaf nodded to himself as another niggling enigma was met with its solution.

"If I go down, so will you," Camden said smoothly, having finally re-summoned his natural ferocity likely to have been fuelled by a spoilt childhood and lack of solid friendship or relationship throughout his lifetime. "I can still get some serious investigation into your section after this operation which won't be good for any of your futures, I can assure you. If you keep quiet then so will I, you have my word."

"The word of a back-stabbing, disgusting little man like you is worthless." Ros' voice cut through the room icily.

"Do you really think you'll get away with Ayla Akbulut's death being unanswered for?" he sneered.

"No, you're right," said Lucas. Everyone in the room looked at him, confusion splayed clearly across their features.

"Publicly, someone has to take the blame," he continued calmly. "Not the whole team, no, but perhaps one officer's faulty judgement?"

"No," said Zaf, having figured out where he was going with this.

"Don't worry, Zaf. It'd be my pleasure to get kicked out if this bastard gets kicked out too."

"Lucas, I-"

"It's the best option, Harry. A public reprimand against MI5 and the exposure of a dodgy Foreign Secretary."

"You'll never-"

"I wouldn't underestimate the power of our intelligence services again, Mr Camden. Although, you won't really get the chance to do so anyway from behind bars."

Lucas sauntered from the room with Harry following closely behind. Zaf watched Ros linger for a second longer; her icy stare piercing the face of their latest traitor before she swept out of the room. Zaf followed in her footsteps, expecting to feel a smile on his own face: but he didn't.

They hadn't won, not really. Lucas was trying to take the blame on their behalf, and Zaf suppressed a shudder at what this might mean.

...

"We can't do this, Harry."

Ros' voice was a tight whisper rippling across Harry's office where she and Zaf sat before him.

"Camden's right. We have got to own up to some of the blame, and Lucas is adamant that he should be the one to pay the price."

"Then talk him out of it," Ros spat.

"Do you think I'm happy about this, Ros?" Harry replied stonily. "Do you think this is what I want?"

Zaf remained silent, scuffing his shoe on the carpet. Harry had been like a father to Lucas, Ros like a best friend (as close as you can be to Ros anyway) and it was obviously awful for them to even contemplate being without him again. He too felt a sour combination of guilt and sadness at the thought of his friend's departure when he'd happily take the blame to get rid of Camden but Lucas was having none of it.

"Zaf, when Lucas got back from Istanbul with you he said something to me."

Zaf, surprised, moved his eyes from the floor to his boss' face.

"What did he say?"

"He said that he got years of torture but deserved it, and that you got years of torture and didn't. He's trying to make up for his old sins again."

"I think eight years in prison is enough," Zaf said, having finally learnt the truth about the bucketfuls of brokenness that Lucas carried on his back from a harrowing conversation with Ros. "He shouldn't have to suffer anymore."

"There's got to be something you can do," Ros almost pleaded.

Harry rubbed a hand across his forehead, the intricate cogs of his brain working overtime before a sudden, mischievous smile gripped his face.

"I've got something in mind."


	42. Chapter 42

_Report on Junior Field Officer Zafar Younis, by Diane Jewell_

It is to be noted that Zaf has made remarkable progress in both his physical and mental wellbeing, and after his imprisonment and subsequent torture that spanned close to four years it is also highly commendable that he is getting back on track. Zaf reports his sleep being hardly disturbed at all except for the occasional nightmare, which was to be expected but may still fade away in the coming months. He is back to his previous weight and has been exercising regularly in order to regain the muscle strength that he lost. Psychologically, he also seems to be coping better. He is coming to accept the deaths of his previous colleagues and close friends Adam Carter and Joanna Portman, and even remarks upon having found a similar friendship potential in Lucas North that he had in Adam, and I quote: 'Adam was able to down more beers, but Lucas is more of a vodka man'. The pair also seems to have bonded over the fact that they have both experienced torture and incarceration although Zaf informs me that this is a topic rarely discussed; rather, it is mutually acknowledged.

I must admit that receiving a phone call from Sir Harry Pearce remarking that Zaf was to return to Istanbul to close down an operation sparked severe worry in me for what may happen to his emotional state. The details of this aforementioned operation I do not know in their entirety, but around that time Zaf revealed that he had been suffering insomnia, vivid flashbacks, as well as experiencing a depressive state. In my professional opinion I thought it incredibly unwise for him to return to the nightmare that he had been trying to escape but I put my faith in his own decision and my knowledge that the Service would do everything it could to protect its officers and miraculously it seems that the experience offered Zaf some form of closure for his ordeal. He is more willing to discuss what happened and it seems any want for revenge has faded away completely, for which I am very thankful – not only could it have offered permanent traumatic consequences but his anger and despair were not even remotely similar to the qualities of the young Zaf I met sporadically several years ago, who had a zest for life and offered brilliance in almost every aspect of the Service. I am pleased on a professional but also personal level that this passion is working its way back into Zaf's personality.

Although this report is highly positive, there are still some issues that need to be addressed. I'd like to continue seeing Zaf, perhaps reducing these meeting to fortnightly rather than weekly, but I still feel it vital to try and prevent some form of relapse. Sir Harry had also discreetly informed me that it's on the cards for Zaf to be promoted which would mean he would be involved on the recruitment programme for MI5, but I have expressly told him that if this decision comes to the forefront that Zaf must only accept it if he is willing and that it can be offered on probation so that he isn't overwhelmed with the additional work and responsibility that a more senior position would inevitably provide.

Finally, I would ask that Zaf gets to see this report in a few weeks or so (immediacy would be preferable but I wouldn't want to ruin the surprise of this potential promotion). He has made such significant progress and should be incredibly proud of his willingness to work alongside me in order for us to overcome his psychological difficulties. Zaf also happens to be one of the most kind-hearted individuals I have encountered and the fact that he possessed the ability to overcome his temporary period of wanting to find a form of revenge for his experience is remarkable. I doubt that few people know the real atrocities that one can experience in the Service but here is a clear-cut example of when such atrocities do not entirely overcome someone with appropriate help and time in order for them to heal. I'm glad to have had some experience of one of its finest officers and I wish Zaf all the best for his future at MI5.

_Diane Jewell_

...

A/N: Definitely a filler chapter, but I wanted to have something positive for Zaf as this story comes to a close. There will be 2 or 3 chapters left (I am yet to decide) and they will be uploaded soon. As always, many thanks to those who are still reading and reviewing :)


	43. Chapter 43

"You can't go," she repeated adamantly.

He looked over his shoulder, watching her lean against the fridge with her arms crossed as he raked through the cupboards, placing packets of rice and tins of beans atop the kitchen counter and binning the few festering apples placed habitually in a wooden bowl for the pretence of a normal home. The place was being stripped of the little life that he had given it, and although it was a pretty tiresome process something about it held a comfort – the knowledge of a new life, a new adventure, was within his grasp.

This time, however, Lucas had a couple of regrets at fleeing. One of them was staring at him, jaw set; even the sharp end to her blonde bob held a sense of intimidation but it wasn't working on him today. It had, at first. Ros Myers, Section Chief, New Boss. Everything about her held importance, each word to describe her heavily adorned with capital letters, but now she stood as his equal. But for the first time since he had come across her just over three years ago, he felt like the stronger opponent.

"You know it's the only option," he said, feigning interest in an almost empty box of Cornflakes.

"You know it's bullshit," she replied, although her voice was venomous and contrasted with the softness with which he had attempted to console her. "Harry can't lose you again."

"Maybe this time he'll get used to it – third time lucky," Lucas smiled, but Ros' expression was stony.

"He doesn't want you to leave."

Lucas shook his head. "He's got over worse. You know why I was chosen for this operation anyway."

"Do I?"

"It was dangerous, and I had nothing to lose. It was a train-wreck pretty much from the beginning, which basically summarises my existence. It wasn't about Harry wanting me back – I was just a useful resource."

"You know that Harry-"

"Used to trust me? Treat me like a son? Yeah, he did. And I threw it back in his face, Ros." Lucas laughed once to himself, sadly. "It's about time I stopped causing hurt to others, don't you think?"

Lucas pushed the cereal box into the bin that was rapidly becoming filled with odds and ends he no longer had a need for. He'd chosen a couple of suits and items of clothing along with leather shoes, trainers and boots to go in his suitcase, the rest of his clothes neatly folded in his wardrobe, ready to be taken to MI5's illustrious clothing section for operations or simply to the charity shop. Lucas had few items of personal value – most of them he had disposed of years ago and almost finished the job after running away from the Albany fiasco – but the odd postcard from Elizabeta from the early years of their relationship were hard to let go of. It puzzled him really, the odd tie to that old life of his. Something about her handwriting, neat and pretty on dainty letters talking about ordinary things and arranging to meet for lunch, felt so achingly normal that Lucas couldn't help but smile and simultaneously feel a dull pain at knowing he'd never again experience something so gloriously ordinary. Along with the postcards he kept a book of poems by William Blake, in which he found an old receipt that always made him chuckle – he and Ros had been out celebrating a successful operation, ended up in a bar in a more expensive area of London unknowingly due to their drunkenness and accidentally bought a bottle of £400 wine. After attempting to explain their mistake Lucas had been manhandled off the property by the disgruntled landlord, with a severely damaged wallet and ego as Ros laughed harder than he'd ever seen.

Lucas held up the receipt and was about to remind her of the story in the hope of cajoling a grin out of her, but her expression made him stop. Ros Myers had given up, her hurt raw and evident on her features.

"Harry has a knack for keeping in contact with postcards," he offered, perching on the arm of the sofa.

"I don't want a bloody postcard," Ros breathed.

"What do you want?" Lucas held back his exasperation because of the fact she looked like she might break.

"I want you to stay," she told him quietly.

The fridge hummed a lonely soundtrack, filling the space between her answer and Lucas' next sentence.

"A part of me wants to stay too."

His answer didn't feel like enough, but it was the truth. Things hadn't felt right, returning for this mission. He never quite slipped back into the team, and this was his own fault. He needed a fresh start away from this old life, no matter how much it might hurt to let go of Five, Harry. Ros.

Lucas cleared his throat and slipped on his jacket. "I'm all done here."

He hadn't needed to say that, as Ros' observational skills would have probably deduced this anyway. The flat was an empty shell, ready for a new life to live in it.

How to say goodbye to someone like Ros? Lucas wracked his brains as he drew out the process of tying his shoelaces. A hug felt far too touchy-feely, a handshake far too formal. But a few kind words didn't seem enough for someone who had grew to mean so much to him.

"You know, I wouldn't doubt that we'll run into each other again sometime," said Lucas lightly, rearranging his mouth into a smile that didn't quite meet his eyes.

"I wouldn't be so sure. Sooner or later one of us is going to kick the bucket, Lucas, and I'd rather me than you. You've had your fair share of near-death experiences," Ros commented.

Lucas snorted. "You nearly drowned in the Thames and narrowly avoided getting blown up with the Home Sec."

"You spent eight years in a Russian prison and then did a swan-dive off Enver Tower," Ros retorted.

Lucas couldn't avoid a little chuckle at how morbid it was that they were comparing traumatic circumstances. "Touché." He noticed Ros' eyes moving towards the door.

"Have you got to be somewhere?" he asked quietly.

Ros shrugged one shoulder. "Meeting with the Home Sec."

"Guess we've both got somewhere to get to," Lucas said. "I'm just regretful it's not the same place."

"Don't," Ros said, more to the floor than to him.

Lucas drew in a breath. "Take care of yourself, Ros," he said with forced brightness, reaching for the door handle.

"You too," she said blankly.

Lucas left his flat and shut the door before he could think of anything better to say, leaning against the wall outside and letting out a groan. Goodbyes were so much easier when you had nothing to lose.

Then the door was flung open and Ros grabbed Lucas into a hug so tight that he remembered that anyone who ever underestimated her strength would be a sorry target. She pulled back quickly and moved away, stepping into the lift and selecting a floor before finally meeting his gaze, one of her eyebrows raised.

"You can take the stairs," she said coolly, before a small smile crept onto her face.

Lucas grinned, watching the lift doors meet in the middle. He pulled his rucksack onto his back and grabbed his suitcase, taking the stairs two at a time down to the taxi waiting outside.

Destination unknown, but freedom finally guaranteed.


	44. Chapter 44

**A/N: We're finally here! Many thanks again to readers and reviewers who have supported this story - I hope you enjoy this final chapter :)**

"Miss Akbulut was killed on Thursday of last week in a botched Security Services operation, for which a male officer who we can only name as Officer K has been removed from duty. However, the murder itself is believed to be linked to the Foreign Secretary Robert Camden who resigned earlier today. Police are also currently questioning Miss Akbulut's husband Fahir in regards to the murder-"

Zaf flicked off the TV on the Grid, having heard it all before – despite Harry's best efforts to keep the story under wraps, a rather unsavoury character from Camden's department leaked the news and consequently would be having his bank account deleted thanks to some meddling from Malcolm. Dr Polat was receiving the best bereavement counselling on offer thanks to a dip in Robert Camden's savings and had sold his mansion in Istanbul, claiming the need of a new life. It appeared that this operation had finally been neatly wrapped up with a pretty little bow on top.

Almost.

Lucas had headed off late last night, and Ros had followed him back to his flat for some last-minute packing. As much as it pained Zaf to say goodbye to the colleague who had saved his life on several occasions and become an important friend, he had to admit that Harry's way of ensuring Lucas wasn't left out in the cold was rather ingenious. It seemed that their boss had a select few expelled members of the service with whom he was in regular contact, and he managed to sort out a work arrangement for Lucas – strictly underground business – with an ex-colleague whom neither Ros or Zaf recognised the name of, but both agreed that this Tom Quinn would be receiving an excellent work-mate and a brilliant friend. The fact that they were both deemed decommissioned strangers would keep them off the radar, meaning they could stay in contact occasionally and still get to do some work for the Service. It was a pleasing outcome considering the difficulties of wrapping up the operation and it would allow Lucas a clean break without being kicked out for good.

Zaf knew full well that Ros didn't do emotional incontinence but for once she was actually being quite open about how she felt. Dimitri and Erin kept politely distanced for which Ros was evidently thankful, but her professionalism came out on top and it wasn't long before she was sharing dry comments with Dimitri and even, surprisingly, forming something of a friendship with Erin. Well, perhaps not a friendship. More like Ros' approach of 'we're stuck with each other so let's not waste time on personal opinions'. That, and they were both driven and stubborn enough that they were the latest workers in the office and got the joint prize from HR at the end of the year for 'hardest working team player'.

The new year itself came and went without anything too untoward (apart from a concerned and slightly short-sighted Londoner who had called the public help-line, or 'weirdo line' as it was commonly known, saying that their neighbour was making a bomb, when they were in fact lighting sparklers in their back garden). The lethargy of early mornings in dark hours was taking its toll but the team still worked diligently, all of them in different ways trying to patch up the Lucas-shaped hole in the Grid with varying levels of success.

A week into January, the post-boy delivered a postcard addressed to Harry from Cornwall, on the back of which was written a hasty scribble of _'Gorgeous views – not so gorgeous weather! Hope to see you soon.'_ Harry had recognised the handwriting and summoned Zaf and Ros to his office as he selected the blade from his office Swiss Army knife and scored away at the paper, revealing the message underneath.

_Didn't let me escape the bloody British weather, huh? All good. Tom sends his best, as do I. Thanks for everything, Harry. Ros, don't bully Erin (or Malcolm). And Zaf, it was a pleasure to get to know you. Word of advice: Dimitri is an excellent bar buddy._

_Your forbidden friend, LN. _

He'd hit the nail right on the head. Gratitude for Harry, who never seemed to get the thanks he deserved. Cool comment for Ros, who wouldn't appreciate soppiness as she was well aware that he had clawed his way into her affections. And a little quip for Zaf who was getting to grips with a genuine smile again thanks to him.

Zaf realised that the Grid would keep on ticking without Lucas, but he had been a key player whose mark on the public's safety and his colleague's affections would never be forgotten.

...

"You alright?" Zaf had headed up to the roof for a breath of air during his lunch break and came across Ros. He remembered suddenly that this was her chosen spot to spend her lunch hour. He realised how people forget little details like that after a long absence.

"I'm fine," she told him. Zaf decided that she would probably appreciate being left in peace but she surprised him, gesturing for him to come and stand next to her.

He watched from the corner of his eye as her gaze grazed the London skyline, observing the crawling traffic and the cloudy grey sky and the Christmas lights woven around the lampposts, yet to be taken down so that a new year could take its place upon the city.

"Why are you up here?" Ros asked him after a while.

"I wanted to remember what London looks like," Zaf told her honestly. "I never wanted to forget, when I was... being held." It was still difficult to talk about, even to Ros who knew him better than most. "I think I appreciate it more after being away, though. It's home."

Ros nodded but didn't meet his eyes. "What about you?" Zaf asked.

"A similar sort of thing," she commented. Zaf raised an inquisitive eyebrow before she elaborated.

"To remind myself why I do this job. I'd rather the people down there didn't get beaten up, or blown up, or have their rights taken away. It's nice to get some perspective now and again."

Zaf was surprised at the sincerity with which she had spoken. Then again, they had both experienced enough of their demons together now for a little more truth and trust to seep into their conversations. It became clear that Ros still favoured her sardonic slant, however, when she turned to him and said: "That's enough sentimental bullshit. Work to do."

Zaf grinned. "This heart-to-heart was sweet, Rosalind. Maybe we should do it again sometime."

Ros raised an eyebrow. "Over my dead body, Zafar."

...


End file.
